


They'll Tear Us Apart If You Give Them the Chance

by summerhaze3579



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Forbidden Love, M/M, Royalty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-20
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-10-21 03:53:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 38,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10677141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerhaze3579/pseuds/summerhaze3579
Summary: Dan and Phil are both princes and they've been taught to hate each other their whole lives. They meet in a forest.





	1. Chapter 1

“Get up.”

Dan groans and rolls over, practically suffocating himself in the pillow as he does so. He doesn’t want to get up.

“That means now, young man.” Dan mumbles something that’s a vague mixture of fuck off and don’t you know who I am, but complies.

“You’ve got a busy day ahead, you know,” his nurse says in an almost reprimanding tone.

“Have I?” Dan asks, prefixed by another groan. Caroline fixes him with a steady glare as she begins fussing over his messy sheets.

“You have indeed,” she says. “Your father would like you ready and dressed by nine for breakfast.”

“Can’t I have-“

“You cannot have breakfast in bed, for the tenth time,” Caroline says, exasperated. “I’ve laid out your suit for you – off you go.” Dan mutters a few curse words under his breath – mostly aimed at his father – before sulkily picking up his suit and wandering off to a nearby bathroom, slamming his bedroom door shut for good measure. He hates getting up early.

Dan pushes open the nearest bathroom door to find it already occupied, his younger brother Louis brushing his teeth in the elegant mirror above the sink.

“You’d think he’d show us a little bit of kindness, after last week,” Dan grumbles, shutting the door behind him and pulling his shirt off.

“Dad? Show us kindness?” Louis remarks sarcastically, spitting in the sink. “Yeah, good one.”

“Fucking- what’s he having us do now?”

“Some garden party, not really sure,” Louis says dismissively, slotting his toothbrush back in place and sitting down on the corner of the gilded bathtub. Dan scowls – he hates garden parties. “Never pay attention when Christie tells me.”

“Caroline doesn’t even bother telling me,” Dan says indignantly, buttoning his dress shirt and searching for his suit trousers.

“We’re off to the border for the weekend, though,” Louis says, handing Dan his trousers. Dan pulls them on with a grimace.

“That’ll be fun,” he says darkly. Heading to the border is always the worst part of the year.

“Yeah,” Louis says nonchalantly. “I hear the Lesters are going to be in Wales, too.”

“Even better,” Dan groans. “Dad won’t shut the hell up about it, will he?”

“Nope.” Dan tightens his tie with a little more force than strictly necessary, resulting in him almost choking himself by accident. Louis rolls his eyes and hands him his toothbrush, toothpaste already on it. If Dan wasn’t in such a bad mood, he’d throw Louis a grateful grin, say what would I do without you?

As it is, he doesn’t do that.

He ruffles his hair in the mirror, not bothering to brush it because he half wants to rile his father this morning, and straightens his tie before nodding at Louis. They leave the bathroom together, side-by-side, and begin the descent through the maze of corridors and stairs that makes up Buckingham Palace.

Daniel James Howell and his brother Louis Alexander Howell are princes. Their father, Edward Howell, is the King of England. Dan’s fourth in line to the throne of a well-respected country, and his father intends to stay alive long enough that if Dan’s going to reign, it will be a short one. He doesn’t trust Dan at all, to say the least.

“What time do you call this?” is how he greets his two sons as they walk through the huge door to the breakfast room.

“One minute to nine in the morning, otherwise known as eight fifty-nine a.m.,” Dan says, sitting down at the far end of the oak table that stretches the expanse of the room.

“Less of that cheek, Daniel.” Dan rolls his eyes but keeps his mouth shut, throwing a warning glance at Louis to do the same when he sees Louis open his mouth angrily to rebuke his father. “I trust you have been thoroughly briefed on today’s activities?”

“Nope,” Dan says, reaching for a croissant. “Haven’t been told a thing.”

“No matter, no matter,” their father says, eyeing Dan warily. “You will simply be in the garden party, no need to do anything but flatter and charm our guests.”

“Why?” Dan asks suspiciously, hand poised midair above his croissant. “What d’you want from them?”

“What do you want from them, Daniel, stop slurring your words, it is rather uncouth. And I desire nothing of them; it’s merely to keep our public image healthy.”

“Your public image healthy,” Dan mutters, thinking of their elder brother Harry and pulling the butter towards him. His father pretends not to hear, clearly thinking along the same lines as Dan.

“The garden party begins at ten. Your mother is unable to attend.”

“She’s in Africa,” Louis points out. “Of course she’s unable to attend.” Their father employs his selective deafness technique again.

“Now, I have something I wish to discuss.”

“How about discussing it then, instead of telling us you need to discuss it?” Dan mutters under his breath. Louis catches it, and snorts.

“We are, of course, heading for our annual trip to the border tomorrow night. However, as our trip had to be shifted due to the unforeseen happenings of last week-“ unforeseen happenings, everyone knew she was going to give birth “-which means that when we are there to pay our respects, the Lesters will be on the other side.” He spits the word Lester like it’s a filthy swear word, far filthier than any he’s ever chastised Dan for using.

“What, all of them?” Louis asks incredulously.

“The immediates,” their father continues snootily. “Charles, Elizabeth and Philip.” Dan sucks in a breath. There are going to be fireworks. “Now, if I see you interacting with any of the Lesters-“

“You’ll castrate us, right.” Their father inhales sharply.

“Daniel James Howell, the crudity- your language-“

“-leaves much to be desired,” Dan choruses along with his father. They’ve been down this road so many times before. “I know.” Their father throws a contemptuous glare at both of his sons.

“You are dismissed.”

Both princes scramble to get away from the table, away from their father, and run through one of the many secret passages in the castle that they and only they know of before exploding into simultaneous angry outbursts.

“The fucking cheek-“

“What does he think he-“

“Wait ‘til I become Ki-“

“Always on about those bloody Lesters-“

“How’d he end up head of the country?” Dan asks, livid.

“Accident,” Louis says. “An unhappy, unfortunate one.”

Back in the good old days, England, Scotland and Wales had been united (and Northern Ireland, but that’s a different island so it doesn’t concern anyone right now). When Dan’s great-grandfather died, he left the isle in turmoil – riots, uprisings; you name it, the nations were at it. It seemed the people of England and Scotland were no longer content being part of a unity which included Wales, and that Wales were not too keen on being part of something involving being bossed around by neighbouring countries either.

So, after a lot of political discussion (and a war), Wales had become independent, a state headed (but not governed) by Henry Lester, the head rioter at the time, who became King Henry I of Wales. The original King of England (and Scotland and Northern Ireland and Australia and Canada and New Zealand etc. etc.) had remained King Henry IX, who had passed it on to his son, who had passed it on to his son (Dan’s father). King Henry of Wales had bequeathed his land to his son and he to his daughter. But the tension between the two families had been high since the war, so much so that they kept a respectable distance between themselves. The hatred of the Lesters had been passed down from generation to generation, and Dan would bet his nicest crown that the same could be said for the Lesters.

They visit the border every year to pay their respects to the Welsh Royals, though at a time where the Welsh Royals are all off paying their respects to the Irish (who helped them in the war) to avoid conflict. They pay their respects to the English Royals when the Howells are off paying their respects to the Scottish and Northern Irish, who had helped them win the war. There’s an awful lot of paying respects to people when nobody respects anyone anyway, Dan thinks, especially where the Lesters and Howells are concerned. King Edward Howell of England is yet to say a single respectful word about the Lesters outside of the watchful public eye.

Dan’s kind of intrigued that the Lesters are going to be there, this time. He’s never seen any of them in person, although he’s seen plenty of pictures. They’re a good-looking bunch, he has to say, with porcelain skin and dark hair and light eyes, the complete opposite to the Howells’ tanned skin and lighter hair and darker eyes. They have a son around his age, Philip, who’s strikingly beautiful – pale complexion contrasted by jet-black hair and set off with azure eyes.

(Not that Dan could ever, ever admit to thinking Philip was something, other than to his brothers. He’s sure Philip’s a stuck-up brat who thinks he’s above everyone because his country is segregated from the rest of the UK. But he’s beautiful, all the same.)

“Yeah, well,” Dan huffs. “He can piss off.” Louis snorts, rounding a corner and kicking open his bedroom door. Dan follows him inside.

“How long have we got?”

“Dad’ll want us out there fifteen minutes before guests start arriving, so…half an hour,” Louis says, checking his watch. Dan moans, throwing himself on Louis’ bed.

“Not long enough.”

“Never is.” Dan lapses into silence, because he has a fair point there.

“D’you think we’ll see them, at the weekend?” he asks after a while, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling.

“Oh God, not you and your creepy Lester fascination again,” Louis says, rolling his eyes. “I don’t know. I doubt it. They haven’t got a castle near the border, have they?”

“Don’t know,” Dan says. “I don’t even know all our castles, let alone theirs.”

“That’s ‘cause you only ever go to Windsor or stay here.”

“Beside the point. Do you think we will?”

“We don’t see much, do we? We go to the monument, lay a wreath and listen to the godawful band for far too long, then go and spend the rest of the weekend moping around in a dingy castle. So unless they’re at the monument – which wouldn’t exactly bode well for the public image – or hiding in our castle, I’d say no, you’re not getting a glimpse of pretty boy.” Dan scowls – he hates when Louis knows what his questions really mean – but he also feels an unpleasant stab of disappointment. Oh. That’s a little odd. Why’s he disappointed? The Lesters are never usually there, anyway, so it’s just like normal. There’s no reason for disappointment.  
-  
The garden party was as boring as they always are, but it meant Dan got the next day off from doing anything at all. He spent the day getting up at an hour his father would deem outrageous, ridiculous, absurd, abominable (amongst other things) and fucking around on the internet, breaking the monotony with a little bit of masturbation and annoying Louis. It’s Friday night, now, and the palace is alive with people fretting that Prince Daniel’s suitcase isn’t where I left it and Prince Louis can’t find his best tie and Princess Elena’s suitcase must be unpacked immediately and repacked for the weekend.

Yeah. Mummy’s home.

Luckily for Dan and Louis, their dearest elder brothers have also returned for the annual we-respect-the-Welsh trip, and Harry’s keeping their mother and father occupied with their ranting about his antics, winking over their shoulders at Dan and Louis who grin back in response.

“Alright?” he asks when he manages to shake off the King and his wife, following Dan and Louis upstairs into a nearby bedroom (William’s elected to stay downstairs with his wife and newborn son, who King Edward and Princess Elena are currently fawning over).

“Been better,” Dan shrugs. “You?”

“You know,” Harry says, grinning mischievously. “Been hanging around.” Dan snorts, because judging by the naked pictures that emerged recently Harry really has been hanging around.

“At your age,” Dan says with a sorrowful shake of his head, imitating his mother. “Outrageous.”

“Ridiculous,” Louis chimes in.

“Absurd,” Dan says firmly.

“Abominable,” they all chorus together, collapsing in fits of giggles.

“How’re you keeping in this place?” Harry asks, lying back on Louis’ bed and letting his head hang off the edge. “’S a nightmare, from what I recall.”

“Still a nightmare,” Dan says regretfully. “Did Dad tell you the Lesters are gonna be there this weekend?”

“No,” Harry says, pulling himself upright and looking confused. The confusion quickly ebbs away, replaced by a dawning look of realisation. “Oh, because we shifted it a week, right? Blame little George, it’s his fault.” He returns to his former position.

“Yeah, now Dad’s gonna have a fit,” Louis says darkly. “Mark my words.”

“He won’t do anything with Will around,” Harry says reasonably. “Favouritism if I ever saw it.”

“Will’s great, though.”

“Yeah,” Harry says gruffly. “If he wasn’t such a perfect human being, I’d hate him. I see why Mum and Dad prefer him. Luckily, they’ve got us three to balance all of Will’s perfection out. Too much perfection isn’t good for you, y’know. We do them a favour by being miscreants.”

“Are these my three favourite brothers I see before me?” a voice says, and the three Howell heads turn to see William standing beaming in the doorway. “Thought I might find you here.”

“Speak of the devil,” Louis says as William shuts the door behind him. “How’s being a father?”

“I don’t think I’ve slept in a week,” William says ruefully, sitting down on the bed. “Harry, sit up, you’ll give yourself a headache.”

“I’d rather have a self-induced headache than a Dad-induced one,” Harry says in a strangled voice. William rolls his eyes and pulls his brother into an upright position.

“Your face is almost as red as your hair,” he says.

“You’re just jealous ‘cause you haven’t got any,” Harry says. William scowls.

“Did you hear the Lesters are going to be around?” Louis asks. William nods.

“Apparently they’re staying in a castle very nearby,” he says. The other three groan.

“Great, that means Dad’s going to be going mental,” Dan says.

“Mum’ll be comparing her dresses to Elizabeth’s,” Harry says.

“Dan’ll be checking Philip out,” Louis says. Harry and William whoop and jeer, laughing as Dan’s face gets redder and redder.

“I won’t be checking anybody out,” he says. “I hate the Lesters just as much as you all do. Including Philip.”

“Yeah, sure,” Harry says in a disbelieving tone. “You want some booty action, don’t lie to us.” Dan opens his mouth to deny it, but he’s interrupted by a sharp rap at the door.

“The cars are ready!” a disembodied voice calls. The princes share irritated looks, rolling their eyes at each other before getting up, straightening their ties and walking out in formation down to the cars.

(Dan always feels like he’s in a Bond movie when it’s like this, the four of them in suits walking side by side out of the palace.)

William’s meant to be getting in a car with his wife and newborn son but according to a chauffeur she’s had a quiet word to rearrange it so she’s travelling alone with the child, and the four Howell brothers get a car to themselves to catch up. Dan gives her a careful hug as he walks past so as not to touch the baby – he’s glad William picked such a wonderful girl.

“Two and a half hours of just us four,” Harry says gleefully when Dan finally clambers inelegantly into the car and the door slams shut behind him. “This is going to be great.”

“Mum and Dad are going to kill us,” William says mournfully.

“Oh, shut up,” Louis says, rolling down a window and waving at a few shocked passers-by.   
-  
“How mad d’you think Mum and Dad’ll be if we stop for KFC?” Harry asks, gazing longingly at one of the aforementioned stores out of the window.

“Considering you’re not exactly in their good books right now…” William says dryly. Harry glares at him.

“We’ve got dinner tonight,” Louis reminds him.

“Aw, fuck. The damn muck they serve us, Christ. I thought I was shot of that when I got out of the palace.”

“Maybe we can get out of it?” Dan suggests. “One of us could ask Mum and Dad really nicely.” All eyes turn to William.

“Why me?” he asks, sounding scandalised although he knows full well why.

“Because Mum and Dad adore you,” Louis says. William rolls his eyes but looks a little pleased.

“I’ll see. I’ll get out of it anyway, I can say I’ve got to attend to the baby.”

“I’ll say I need to be a good uncle and be there,” Dan says at once.

“I’ll say I’m thinking of having kids myself and-“

“Oh, shut up, they’ll be even more panicky if you say that after your debacle in Vegas,” Louis says. Harry scowls.

“I’ll say I’ve been invited to dinner at the Lesters’, then, see how that goes down,” he says childishly. Dan snorts.

“Oh, yeah, as if Dad’s going to let you out of the castle.”

“He can’t stop me. I’m a grown man, I can do what I want.”

“As the Vegas pictures show.”

“Can we stop bringing those up?” Harry demands. Dan’s sorely tempted to make a joke about Harry’s poor choice of words but refrains, because the four Howell brothers haven’t been together in a stupidly long time and he misses it a lot. Sure, it’s fine with just Louis because that’s how the latter half of his childhood’s been anyway, but it’s nice to be together, especially as they all get on so well. “Anyway, if anyone’s going to be interested in having dinner at the Lesters’, it’s not me, is it?” He throws a smirk in Dan’s direction, and Dan scowls in response.

“I don’t fancy Philip Lester, oh my God,” he says hotly. “I just- he’s pretty, okay? You can’t deny that.”

“I can’t wait ‘til Dad finds out you’ve got the hots for Philip Lester,” Harry says dreamily. “Just imagine. I will no longer be the runt of the family.”

“I will no longer be in the family,” Dan says. “But I don’t have the hots for him, fuck. I’ve never even met the boy. I’m sure he’s a perfect example of a prize twat.”

“If Charles Lester’s anything to go by, he will be,” Harry says.

“There you go,” Dan says, satisfied. “I don’t date twats.”

“That’s because you don’t like twats,” Louis points out.

“Obviously, who does like tw- oh, I get it, very funny,” Dan says, folding his arms and glaring at his younger brother.

“You know, it’s just Dad’s prejudices,” William says. “Philip might turn out to be a lovely boy, you never know. And if there happens to be a Romeo and Juliet situation, we’ll be here.” There’s silence as everybody stares at him. “What?” he asks defensively. “I was just saying.”

“Yeah, about that…I doubt Dan’s going to be chucking himself onto daggers because of a Lester,” Harry says after a moment, and they leave it at that.  
-  
“Wake up.” Dan groans and rolls over in bed. He doesn’t want to wake up. “Dan, fuck’s sake, we’ve got to get up and get changed. The ceremony’s in a couple of hours.” Dan groans again but opens one eye, shutting it again as it’s attacked by blinding light.

“Time is it?” he asks.

“Eight thirty, ceremony’s at ten. Come on, don’t make me get Will in,” Louis’ voice threatens.

“Will’s prob’ly too busy with th’baby,” Dan mumbles. Louis shoves him roughly, and Dan rolls over onto his back with a squawk of indignance.

“Do you bloody well mind?” he asks.

“Not really,” Louis says mildly. “Get up, you lazy git.” Dan groans again, but obliges, rolling out of bed and standing up, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

“Clothes?” he asks. Louis points to a suit hung neatly on the wardrobe, and Dan eyes it with distaste. William Hunt, his least favourite.

“C’mon,” Louis says, his own suit folded over his arm. “Harry’ll already be in the bathroom.” Dan rolls his eyes and mutters a few of his choicest swear words under his breath but complies, grabbing his suit and following Louis into the bathroom. Sure enough, Harry’s already in there, changed and preening himself in the mirror.

“Sleep alright?” he asks without looking away from the mirror.

“Yeah, you?” Louis replies as the two youngest Howells begin stripping and re-clothing themselves.

“Not bad, yeah. Listen, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Will’s told me the Lesters are probably going to be there.”

“Oh, shit,” Dan groans, buttoning his shirt. “How humiliating.”

“I know,” Harry says. “Apparently it’s to show how we can get on, or something, but everyone knows it’s because Charles Lester wants a good gloat whilst we bow down before him.”

“That’s just wonderful,” Louis says, turning to Dan to do his tie for him, because as Dan’s been tying Louis’ tie from a young age Louis never bothered to learn. “Right. Well, I’m not going down to breakfast, then.”

“Good plan, Lou,” Harry says seriously. “Dad’s already on the warpath. Dan…be careful, yeah? I mean, Dad’s probably going to be looking elsewhere, but…watch where your eyes are straying.” Dan begins to protest, but Harry simply holds up his hand. “I’m not preaching, I don’t judge you, you can not have the hots for Philip or you can have the hots for Philip, I don’t care either way. But Dad will, and…just be careful, alright?”

“Alright,” Dan says grudgingly, because much as it infuriates him, Harry’s got a point.

“Great,” Harry says, throwing an apologetic smile in Dan’s direction. “Let’s hide out in Will’s room until they call us down.”  
-  
It’s uncharacteristically hot, and Dan’s boiling in his suit. A quick glance to his left confirms the same for Louis. The band’s already started, too, abusing Dan’s poor youthful ears with their loud, stately music as some cameras circle overhead to allow the BBC some footage to go with their extremely uninteresting commentary.

“Out of the cars in ten seconds,” their chauffeur says. The brothers count down in their heads, each reaching one at a different time and scrambling to the door. William shoves them all away, throwing them meaningful looks that say remember, I’m the oldest and the only one who knows how to behave before exiting the car in the most elegant manner Dan’s ever seen. Harry rolls his eyes and follows, and Dan nearly stumbles as he follows his elder brothers out of the car.

They approach the monument in a row, walking in step with each other behind their mother and father. As they get nearer, Dan can make out three figures on the other side of the monument – the Lesters. 

“Ignore them,” he grits out as he feels Louis stiffen next to him.

“Bastards,” Louis spits back. Dan has to suppress a snort; Harry’s not so tactful.

The band stops playing and the princes stop walking as they reach the monument. The usual speech begins, about how independency and unity can be achieved without upsetting the balance of the nations or whatever, but Dan’s not listening. He can recite this speech word for word by now. He’s trying to squint against the sun and make out the features of the three Lesters stood on the other side of the border.

Before he’s even realised it, Harry’s stepping forwards and receiving his wreath, placing it on one edge of the monument before stepping back. It’s Dan’s turn, and he fucking hates when the attention is on him – he can feel the cameras making the hair on the nape of his neck stand up – and he practically grabs his wreath from the man’s white-gloved hand, chucks it down on the monument and steps back, breathing heavily. Harry’s fingers brush against his – it’s alright, mate, you did it – and Dan fights to bring his laboured breathing back to normal again. Once Louis’ gone and come back, wreath laid neatly next to Dan’s upside-down one (that’s why his mother had glared at him), there’s another dull speech about unifying the nations in love and heart and soul or something equally absurd, before the band’s playing the national anthem of first the Welsh and then the English countries. Dan stands there stoically for the former, and half-heartedly sings God save my fucking Dad for the latter.

Finally, fucking finally, it’s time to go. They march in a stately manner back to the cars and get in, waiting with bated breath for the cars to pull away from the monument before breathing a sigh of relief.

“You really hate this, don’t you?” Harry says kindly.

“Oh, no, best part of being royal, this is,” Dan says sarcastically, and Harry smiles and gives him a bag of Minstrels that he’s kept in his pocket. “Fucking- you’re the best brother ever,” he exclaims with a grateful grin in Harry’s direction as he starts eating his anxiety.

“Not long ‘til we’re back at the castle, then you can go for your walk,” Will says. Dan always goes for a long walk in the nearby forest to calm himself down after this ceremony.

“Yeah,” Dan says, leaning his clammy forehead against the cool tinted glass of the car and not even caring that the window steams up.   
-  
Dan’s in the forest after an hour of being yelled at by his father for failing so miserably at walking up and another hour of being yelled at by his mother for putting the wreath on upside down and ‘throwing it, Daniel, throwing the wreath, that is not what a prince does’ which had resulted in him retorting with a ‘yeah? Maybe I don’t want to be a prince’. It’s calming to be in the half-familiar environment, the soft crunch of leaves underfoot adding a tranquil tone to the mood. He’s already starting to feel less hyped up and anxious and angered.

Suddenly, he hears a rustling from the right and whirls around, heartbeat skyrocketing, ready to face off whoever’s there.

“Who’s there?” he calls, hating the note of fear in his own voice.

“Who’s there?” a soft voice calls back. Dan scowls.

“I asked you first.” There’s another rustling before the leaves of a thick bush are parting and a boy is walking through, a boy with jet-black hair and porcelain skin set off with azure eyes.

Philip Lester.

Dan’s immediately on guard.

“What do you want?” he spits. “This isn’t your ground.”

“There’s no law that says I can’t come into your country,” Philip retorts.

“Well, we don’t want you here, so fuck off.”

“I can do what I want.” Philip’s eyes are flashing with infuriation at being spoken to like this, and Dan’s own eyes linger on them a moment too long.

“Not here you can’t. Get back to your own country.”

“What are you going to do, start another war?” Philip’s voice is soft, lilting, taunting.

“What are you going to do, lose it?” Dan’s voice is equally taunting, and Phil stiffens.

“You fucking dickhead,” he hisses. Clearly his country’s history is still a weak point for him.

“You piece of shit.”

“My dad was right about you. Said all the Howells are a bunch of twats.”

“Yeah?” Dan says, challenging. “Well, my dad said all the Lesters are inbred bastards who can’t run their own country for shit. And they’re twats.”

“You watch how you talk about my family, Daniel,” Philip says menacingly.

“Dan,” Dan corrects without thinking, cursing himself as soon as he realises the syllable has left his mouth.

“What?” Philip looks taken aback. Dan bites his lip.

“Dan, I- I don’t like Daniel,” Dan says, scratching his arm awkwardly. Philip stares at him for a few moments before smiling slightly warily.

“Same. I prefer Phil.” Phil. It does suit him far better than Philip, which Dan associates with his grandfather.

“Why are you here?” Dan asks after a moment, seeing as they’re being a little more polite now.

“I- got a bit lost.” Phil’s answer is evasive and Dan’s not entirely sure if he believes it, but whatever. He’s not going to question it now.

“Oh.” Dan’s answer is inadequate, but what’s he meant to say?

“Why are you here?” Phil asks. Dan bites his lip again, wondering whether to tell Phil the truth or not. He hasn’t exactly got many good cover stories, anyway, other than I fancied a walk which is implausible because nobody fancies a walk in their William Hunt suits.

“I…I’m not very good at like, public stuff, I get really nervous so- I have to have a walk to calm down.” He clenches his fists, waiting for Phil to ridicule him, but Phil smiles softly.

“Same.” Dan frowns.

“You didn’t even do anything.” Phil shrugs awkwardly.

“Being in the public eye is enough,” he admits. “I’m just not good at human interaction and stuff. I…I haven’t got any friends.”

“Me either,” Dan confesses quietly. “I’ve got my brothers, and that’s it.”

“I haven’t even got any brothers.” Phil looks so downcast that Dan wants to reach out and hug him- wait, what, no he doesn’t, Phil’s a Lester. Dan doesn’t want to do anything but punch him, right?

“I’m sorry,” Dan says. “It’s hard enough being a prince, let alone…” He doesn’t finish his sentence. Let alone being a lonely one sounds far too harsh.

“It’s okay,” Phil says, though from the tone of his voice it’s anything but. “I’ve lived seventeen years of it, I can manage.”

“Are you going to join up when you’re of age, as well?” Dan asks. In the English royal family, it’s custom for the men to sign up to one of the armed forces. Dan’s the only one who’s not keen on it – William and Harry already have, and Louis can’t wait to, but Dan wants a different career. He hasn’t dared to broach the subject with his parents, though.

“I- I dunno, I mean, my parents want me to but…” Phil breaks off, biting his lip. “It’s not for me, y’know?”

“Same,” Dan says, feeling an odd sense of relief that he’s not the only one. “Mum and Dad don’t really want me to have other careers, though.”

“Yeah,” Phil says in an exhale. “Me either.” They stand there awkwardly for a few minutes before Phil speaks again.

“I should go,” he says.

“No, don’t,” Dan says, and immediately bites his lip. What the fuck is he saying? He shouldn’t even be talking to Phil at all, let alone telling him to stay.

But for some reason, Phil’s company feels even better than his brothers’.

“Oh- um, okay,” Phil says, sounding surprised and confused but not…not annoyed, or anything else Dan was searching for in his voice.

“Sorry, I just-“

“No, it’s okay, I mean…I…I kinda like you.” Phil blushes so deeply after muttering those words that Dan’s reminded of Harry’s hair.

“I kinda like you too.” Dan knows the words are true as soon as they’ve left his mouth, and he smiles shyly at Phil.

“D’you…wanna walk, or something?” Phil asks nervously. “I’m sorry, I don’t really know what to do, I mean…I’ve never had a friend or anything…” Dan’s heart jumps at the word friend. Is Phil considering him a friend already?

“We could just…sit down and talk?” Dan offers. Phil looks torn for a moment before he nods, walking hesitantly over to a nearby boulder and sitting down. Dan hovers for only a moment before joining him, sitting on the same boulder that doesn’t seem nearly as big as it looked now that both Phil and he are sitting on it. He’s so close to Phil that he can feel Phil’s body heat, hear Phil’s breathing, see the thick, inky eyelashes that frame his blue eyes – blue eyes that are turned on him, wide with fear.

“Have I got something on my face?” Phil asks worriedly, and Dan realises he was staring. He can feel himself blushing as he tears his gaze away, forcing himself to look at a tree and think of something un-blushworthy as he shakes his head and mutters a pathetic excuse. Phil’s eyes are even prettier up close.

“So,” Phil says awkwardly after a moment.

“So,” Dan agrees, not trusting himself to turn back to Phil. He’s afraid he’s going to be overcome with the overwhelming urge to kiss Phil, and everything’s going to go wrong.

“You’re not as bad as I thought you’d be,” Phil says quietly. “I thought you’d be a brat.”

“I thought you’d be a brat,” Dan says with a laugh. “It’s my dad, he imparts his views on anyone who’ll listen – and anyone who won’t, actually. Just anyone.”

“Same,” Phil sighs. “I don’t even get on with my dad. He despairs for me. My parents have been trying for another child for ages, y’know, because they don’t want me in charge.”

“Oh, fuck, I forgot you’re the sole heir,” Dan says, turning back to Phil with wide eyes. He’s lucky he’s fourth in line and will never be King, now little George has been born – he hates being in the public eye. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Phil says, but by the panicked look in his eyes and the way he’s biting his lip it’s anything but. Dan doesn’t know what to do in this situation, so settles for putting a hesitant arm around Phil’s shoulders. Phil looks surprised at first, but relaxes into Dan’s touch almost immediately.

“You’ll be okay,” Dan promises. “Especially when Will gets to the throne. He’s a right sweetheart, trust me, he’ll be your best friend.” Phil’s laugh still sounds anxious. “Seriously, it’s just my dad who’s a twat. And my mum. But me and my brothers, we have nothing against you guys.” It’s a lie, but his brothers are open-minded and he knows they won’t have anything against Phil once he’s introduced to them.

“You think?” Phil asks in a small, timid voice.

“I know,” Dan says reassuringly, smiling at Phil. “Trust me, Wales and England will be the best of friends again.” Phil’s smile is relieved this time, when he looks up at Dan, and Dan finds himself gazing into Phil’s entrancing blue eyes once again, watching the various emotions flit through them – surprise, confusion, tentative happiness – before flicking his eyes down to Phil’s lips momentarily, barely noticeably, and wondering what it would be like to kiss him.

They’re close now, from Dan’s arm being around Phil and the fact Dan’s gazing down at Phil whilst Phil’s gazing up at Dan, so close that their noses are almost touching and their lips are mere centimetres apart.

“Can I…can I kiss you?” Phil whispers, so softly that if Dan hadn’t been this close to him he wouldn’t have heard it.

“Yeah,” Dan whispers back, but he’s the one who closes the gap between their lips, gasps a little as he feels Phil’s lips soft and warm against his own. Fuck.

They pull away after a few moments, but Phil’s eyes are shining.

“That was…nice,” he says, and Dan huffs out a laugh.

“It was better than nice,” he says, because he’s already aching to feel Phil’s lips on his own again.

“True,” Phil allows with a small smile, and Dan kisses him again just because he can. This time, though, Phil’s lips are parted and Dan can slip his tongue in, tangle it with Phil’s and taste him, vanilla and coffee and something he can’t put his finger on. Phil’s hands dance down Dan’s side, making him gasp slightly into the kiss and deepen it hungrily, and rest on his hips whilst Dan brings his other hand up to knot in Phil’s silky, onyx hair. Phil moans into the kiss and Dan’s suddenly aware that there’s shuddering shots of arousal coursing through his veins and if he’s not careful he’s going to get properly hard soon – he’s half-hard already, without even realising – and he pulls away, leaving both of them breathless.

“Fuck,” Dan says after a moment, letting his eyes flutter shut.

“This is so fucked up,” Phil says. “We’re meant to hate each other. This is like Romeo and Juliet.” Dan huffs out a laugh, thinking back to the earlier situation in the car.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” he says. “I’m not drinking any poison for you.”

“Hey,” Phil protests, “who said I’m the girl?”

“I did,” Dan grins. Phil pouts, and Dan can’t help but kiss it away. Phil’s lips are addictive.

“You’re addictive,” Dan tells him.

“You too,” Phil says, leaning up to brush their lips together again, trailing his fingers a little further along Dan’s hipbones and Dan shivers involuntarily, because the skin there is so sensitive it’s bordering on pain.

“Stop it,” Dan tells him, although his voice is weak with pleasure. “You’re gonna get me hard in the middle of a forest. We only met half an hour ago.”

“True,” Phil says. “I was meant to be home half an hour ago.”

“Are you saying you’d rather be home than have this glorious body?” Dan asks with a grin. Phil raises an eyebrow, suddenly much more confident than before (although Dan is too, having established Phil wants to kiss him and enjoys kissing him and likes him).

“Maybe I am,” he says, and Dan scowls.

“You’re just as mean as I thought you’d be,” he says petulantly.

“Come off it,” Phil says, but he looks slightly worried, blue eyes filled with fear. He still looks gorgeous.

“You’re too pretty for your own good,” Dan tells him, and he can feel Phil’s grin as he kisses Dan again.


	2. Chapter 2

“Did you see them?” King Edward explodes at the table. Dan lowers his eyes, focusing determinedly on his food. “Standing on their side of the monument, watching us with insufferable smugness. If I had my way…”

“Elizabeth’s dress was far uglier than mine,” Princess Elena says snootily, daintily playing with a few beans on her plate. “Jenny Packham, what was she thinking? A whole class below mine. Commoners wear Jenny Packham.”

“And their son! Their brute of a son, that Philip boy with his overgrown hair and his unsightly suit. It’s outrageous, it is. Ridiculous family, absolutely absurd…abominable, really, how they can raise a child like that.” Dan’s trying not to listen, trying his best to ignore his parents and their fucking prejudices but it’s hard. He’s not so good at the selective hearing technique that his father so enjoys using.

“Well?” King Edward prompts his sons expectantly. “What did you think of the Lesters’ appearance, their presence at the ceremony?”

“I quite liked Elizabeth’s dress,” Harry says mildly, but Dan catches a gleam in his eye and knows he’s done it on purpose to rile his mother. Princess Elena swells angrily, puffing out her chest and inhaling sharply.

“Well, Henry, as a young man with no knowledge of couture whatsoever, I do not consider your opinion of much importance,” she hisses. Harry shrugs, but he’s fighting a smirk.

“I dunno, I mean, surely being a man makes my opinion much more important?” he says, not looking up from his plate. “I’m sure she’s dressing to impress men, to make men think she’s beautiful, rather than women.” His mother seems to have no retort to this so resorts to throwing a contemptuous glare at her second-born child.

“You boys have the most atrocious grasp of the English language,” their father says hotly. “Do not slur your words.”

“Soz,” Harry says, and the gasp from both their parents is audible and far too amusing for the younger Howells to take. Louis chokes on his mouthful of venison and William coughs into his hand, whilst Dan settles for stifled giggles.

“Henry Charles Albert David!” their father yells angrily, slamming his fist on the table. “As a potential future King, I demand that you speak in the correct manner.”

“But I’m connecting with the people,” Harry says innocently.

“Excuse me,” Dan says, sounding strangled from holding back further laughter, and he stands up from the table and almost runs out of the room, up the stairs and into Harry’s bedroom. He hears footsteps behind him but doesn’t turn around to see who it is – he knows, anyway – and a few seconds later his three brothers are tumbling into the room, giggling and chortling with mirth.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” William says, even though he’s snorting with laughter. “Now they’re going to be even angrier at you.”

“I don’t care,” Harry says happily. “It was worth it. Did you see the look on his face?”

“The look on Mum’s face was better,” Louis says. “Oh, man. I’m going to compliment Elizabeth more if that’s what it does.”

“I knew he was going to slag the Lesters off,” Harry says. “He was just waiting all day, waiting for a moment where the family’s all together so he has an audience.”

“Philip didn’t even look that bad,” Louis says, shooting a surreptitious sideways glance at Dan accompanied with half a smirk. “Don’t you think, Dan?”

“Shut up,” Dan says fiercely and turns his face away because he can feel himself blushing, can feel his face giving everything away, but Harry knows him and twists him back around to face them.

“Checking him out, were you?” William says in a teasing voice.

“No,” Dan says, clenching his fists and willing himself to stop blushing, stop blushing, stop fucking blushing.

“Hang on,” Louis says slowly. Dan’s stomach sinks. “You…Dan, what’s happened?”

“Nothing,” Dan says, but it’s too quick and he knows it, all of them know it.

“Oh my God, what happened?” Harry says in awe.

“Nothing,” Dan insists.

“Your face isn’t telling me that,” Harry says, indicating Dan’s flushed cheeks. Dan scowls and throws himself face first on a bed so nobody can see him as he mumbles a quick I kissed him. Nobody can hear it, he’s sure of it.

“You what?” William says, hauling Dan up from where he’s half-trying to suffocate himself in the silken quilt. “What did you say?”

“Nothing,” Dan says. “Can we talk about something else?”

“No,” Louis says determinedly, “why are you blushing so much? You weren’t even checking him out, you couldn’t see him…Dan, we’re your brothers.”

“Was it when you went for a walk?” Harry says, and Dan’s split-second hesitation tells him what he needs to know. “You met him, didn’t you? In the forest? Did you fight? Are you hurt?”

“No. I mean, well, yes,” he amends, “I did meet him in the forest, and we did fight, but I’m not hurt. It was just verbal.”

“Did you do any non-verbal stuff?” Harry asks, wiggling his eyebrows lewdly. Dan practically yelps.

“Harry!” he says indignantly.

“Did you?” Harry presses. Dan wavers.

“Yeah,” he admits eventually in an exhale. None of the three brothers say anything, merely gawping at him, and Dan feels horrifically uncomfortable and self-conscious all of a sudden. They won’t hate him, right? Only his parents will, and he’s okay with that. His brothers don’t really hate Phil, do they?

“Congratulations,” Harry crows, breaking the silence with a huge grin. “I knew you had the hots for him.”

“Shut up, oh my God,” Dan mutters, mortified. Harry smirks.

“You met him in the forest and kissed him?” Louis says sceptically. “You’d only known him like, a few minutes.”

“I know, I know,” Dan says, burying his burning face in his hands. The more he thinks about it, the guiltier he feels and the more wrong it seems – but it had felt so fucking right, at the time, so how could it be wrong?

Because people don’t progress that fast, don’t progress from never having seen one another to arguing to suddenly not arguing to kissing. That’s not normal, that’s not how it works.

But maybe Dan doesn’t want it to be normal, because it had felt so natural and right and okay and good like that, the way things had worked out. They’re hardly the height of normality themselves, being princes, so surely it’s okay for them to live out an unorthodox life with unorthodox relationships. Right?

“I do that,” Harrys says, sounding as perplexed as he looks. “Is that not okay?”

“No, but you’re a whore, Harry,” William reminds him. “I didn’t kiss Kate until our second date.”

“I can’t exactly take Phil out on dates, though,” Dan says.

“Oh, he’s Phil now, is he?” Louis says with a smirk. Dan scowls and flips him off, feeling the burn slowly subsiding from his face.

“That’s true,” William says with a frown. “I mean, he lives in Wales and you live in England, and even if you did somehow manage to meet up your faces are pretty recognisable and you’d have the press hounding you. And then Dad would find out and you would no longer have balls.” Dan groans.

“Fuck,” he swears. “Why’ve I got to be a bloody prince? I don’t want this life. I’m not even becoming King, so what’s the point? Why do we bother?”

“Hey,” William says gently, putting an arm around Dan’s shoulders. Dan leans into him subconsciously, just like when Dan used to have nightmares and William used to come and calm him down. “We’ll figure it out, okay?” Dan sighs and nods, and William pulls him into a proper hug. The fact that William said we makes Dan feel a little better already, because it means his brothers don’t judge him or hate him for whatever’s going on with Phil.

“Are you going to see him tomorrow?” Louis demands. Dan shrugs.

“Maybe,” he says. “We didn’t make any plans.”

“Go to the forest,” Harry says. “He might be there.”

“Yeah, and if he’s not, just go to fucking Wales and find him,” Louis chimes in. “There’s only so many places he can be.”

“Yeah, because wandering into the Lester castle and demanding the presence of their son who I’ve made out with is going to go down well,” Dan says sarcastically.

“You made out?” Harry asks. “Why don’t you tell me these things? Was it good? Was he good? I haven’t kissed that many boys before, so I can’t really judge, but.”

“I haven’t kissed any boys either, in case you forgo- wait, hang on, when’ve you kissed boys?” Dan asks suspiciously. Harry grins impishly.

“Everyone has to experiment, y’know?” he says.

“Yeah, you most of all,” William says darkly, arm still around Dan. “I remember.” Dan decides not to push the subject for now, but makes a mental note to ask Harry later, when he’s not with William and Louis. He has a feeling if he asks for tips in front of Louis it won’t be forgotten. Ever.

“Well, if Mum and Dad let you out tomorrow, go,” Louis says. “In fact, fuck it, go anyway. We can cover for you. Say you’ve got spattergroit or something.”

“You need to stop re-reading Harry Potter,” William tells him.

“I really don’t,” Louis says.   
-  
Dan’s been jittery all morning, annoying anyone and everyone who comes near him so much that even Harry’s told him to shut up and stop being so edgy, and has left him alone. He was up most of the night worrying that Phil didn’t actually like him and it was all an elaborate hoax, and woke up at an ungodly hour (eight a.m.) realising that if Phil’s going to be in the forest at all, it won’t be at eight in the morning, so had stayed in bed, subdued, until ten.

It’s now one in the afternoon and they’ve just finished lunch with their parents, who were halfway through complaining about the Lesters when a humble chauffeur told them one of the cars wasn’t working and they’d have to leave a little later than usual and had switched to complaining about that instead. Dan’s heart had jumped a little, because more time with Phil, before he’d realised that Phil’s probably not even in the forest today (why would he be?).

“I’m going for a walk,” he tells his mother, who’s absent-mindedly chastising a maid for her abysmal flower-arranging skills.

“Where?” she asks.

“Forest,” Dan says.

“What for?” she says suspiciously.

“Drugs,” Dan says with a straight face. “See you later.” Before she has a chance to squawk and flap her arms and generally do a relatively decent impression of a chicken, Dan walks calmly to the stairs and descends, following the courtyard until he reaches the heavy oak door that leads to the garden and the forest. The walk through the forest isn’t a long one, because the forest isn’t very big, but he wants to get far enough away from the castle that he knows nobody is tailing him before he sees if he can find Phil.

Oh. That’s a point. Even if Phil’s here, how’s Dan going to find him?

He thinks about going back to the clearing they were in yesterday, but realises with his atrocious navigation skills he’ll probably end up in Greece, so abandons that idea. The only other plausible option he’s got is to call Phil’s name and see if he responds.

“Er,” he says, feeling stupid as he turns around in a small clearing. “Phil?” There’s no reply, but then again, Dan had said it rather quietly, so…

“Phil?” he tries again, a little louder. Still no reply. “Phil!” he yells, and there’s a rustling somewhere behind him. He whirls around just in time to see Phil stumble out from some trees, breathless and looking bashfully haphazard.

“Take your time,” he says to Dan. “I’ve been here since eleven.”

“What?” Dan says, his heart thudding loudly when he realises that means that Phil wanted to see him again too. “I had to have lunch, sorry.”

“Oh, s’alright,” Phil says, waving his apology away. “You’re here now.”

“Yeah,” Dan says, and he can’t help but grin as he takes in Phil’s appearance. He’s dressed down today, just like Dan, in black skinnies and a Muse shirt that his parents can hardly approve of. His hair’s bedraggled, although that’s probably from stumbling through the forest, and his eyes are shining inquisitively at Dan’s sweeping gaze. Dan quirks his lips up in a smile. Phil’s utterly gorgeous.

“I like your shirt,” he says, nodding at Phil’s shirt. Phil picks at the hem, looking down in surprise.

“You like Muse?” he says. Dan nods.

“Matt Bellamy, also known as yes please,” he says emphatically, and Phil laughs, melodic and tuneful and perfect.

“I prefer Dom,” he admits.

“Either way,” Dan says dismissively. “Muse are cool.”

“You have good taste,” Phil compliments. Dan bows lowly.

“I thank thee,” he says, and Phil snorts.

“Get up, I have enough people bowing to me on a daily basis,” he says. Dan sighs.

“What’s it like, over the border?” he asks wistfully.

“Full of sheep,” Phil says seriously. “Er, there’s quite a lot of trees. And like, nature stuff. People are really friendly.”

“What about as a royal?” Dan wants to know. “Do you have all the dumb traditions we have?” The fucking opening of parliament, or whatever it’s called, and all that crap where the guy gets the door shut in his face and has to ram it with a pole until people open it again. Dumb shit.

“Nah, not really,” Phil shrugs. “I mean, just a few things we picked up from you guys. It’s not like we’ve had much of a chance to make traditions; the monarchy’s only three generations old.”

“True,” Dan allows. “Court still stressful?”

“You bet,” Phil says. “Fucking hell, yes. Mainly my parents trying to find me a suitable wife. They refuse to accept that I’m not interested in women.”

“That sucks,” Dan says, sighing. At least his parents accept his sexuality (although he doubts they’ll be so accepting when they find out who he’s been with).

“Tell me about it,” Phil says, kicking a leaf mournfully. “They’re determined to get grandchildren so I can carry on the line.”

“What if you don’t?” Dan asks. He hadn’t thought about that.

“Well,” Phil says. “If I don’t, then, um. The throne goes back to you guys. You’re the next-in-lines – it was part of the peace terms the Henries signed.” Dan’s surprised – he never knew that.

“No wonder your parents aren’t too keen on the idea of you not wanting a wife,” he muses. Phil snorts.

“Yeah,” he says. “No matter how many times I’ve told them I like dick, they won’t accept it.” Dan chokes.

“You don’t say it like that, do you?” he asks. Phil shrugs.

“Mostly not,” he says with a grin, and Dan stares at him. “Hey, don’t judge. If ‘I’m not into women’ doesn’t get the message across, ‘I want dick up my arse’ probably will.”

“You’re unbelievable,” Dan says, shaking his head, but he’s grinning despite himself (mainly to try and hold back the flashes of Phil underneath him that his mind has helpfully conjured up). He wishes he had the audacity to say that to his parents, just to see the looks on their faces. He bets Harry would.

“Am I going to see you again?” Phil asks quietly after a moment, not meeting Dan’s gaze. Dan sighs.

“I don’t know,” he says honestly. “We only come here once a year, and it’s when you’re off in Ireland.” Phil bites his lip, looking crushed.

“I mean, we don’t go into England ever, like, ever,” he says. “And we go to the border when you’re in…”

“Scotland,” Dan supplies. “Or Northern Ireland.” Phil sighs.

“So this is it, then?” he says, and he sounds so fucking subdued that Dan’s heart tugs a little.

“No,” Dan says. “We’ll find a way.”

“But there is no way,” Phil says. “We can’t exactly tell our parents, we live too far apart, our faces are too recognisable for any sneaking around…”

“Look,” Dan says firmly. “I’ll make it work, okay? This isn’t going to be the last time you see me.”

“I hope not,” Phil mumbles, stepping forwards and wrapping his arms around Dan, burying his face in Dan’s shoulder. Dan slides his arms around Phil’s waist, resting his cheek on Phil’s head. It’s stupid how much he cares already, how much it’s aching to think that maybe this is the one and only time they’ll see each other. He never wants it to end.

“Hey,” Dan says gently, pulling away slightly, just enough to look at Phil earnestly. “Trust me, okay?”

“Okay,” Phil says, sounding thoroughly miserable, and Dan leans forwards and presses their lips together, soft and chaste and warm like nothing he’s ever experienced before. Phil slides his hands down to rest on the small of Dan’s back, and Dan smiles slightly, deepening the kiss. Phil moans softly, pressing his hips against Dan’s in a subconscious effort to get closer and Dan pulls him in as tight as he can, kissing him with every inch of passion he’s got. Phil moans again, louder this time, and it sends a jolt of arousal coursing through Dan’s veins straight to his cock, and he feels himself getting hard. He pulls away, leaving both of them breathless, and leans his forehead against Phil’s, letting his eyes flutter shut.

“Stop almost getting me hard,” he says. Phil huffs out a laugh.

“Stop being easily turned on.”

“Stop being hot.” Phil pouts.

“It’s your fault,” he says in an accusing tone. “If you didn’t get hard so easily, we wouldn’t have to stop kissing.”

“Shut up,” Dan says, kissing him so he can’t reply. It’s perfect but achingly so, kissing Phil like this, because he can’t help but wonder when or if he’ll ever be able to again. When they break apart, Phil smiles wistfully at Dan.

“I hate this,” he says quietly.

“Me too,” Dan sighs. “Hey – d’you have a phone?”

“Yeah,” Phil says, digging around in his back pocket. “Gonna give me your number?”

“No, I was gonna give you my dad’s,” Dan says sarcastically, taking the iPhone Phil holds out to him and unlocking it swiftly.

“Great, I’ll call him and tell him we’re eloping,” Phil grins, watching as Dan types in his number. “Give yourself a pseudonym, I don’t know if Mum and Dad will look through my phone.” Dan throws Phil an exasperated glance but saves himself as Jeremy Kyle, before handing the phone back to Phil who stares at it appreciatively.

“Wonderful,” Phil says. “Now I’ll get erotic texts from Jeremy Kyle.” Dan snorts.

“Who says they’re going to be erotic?” he says.

“Me,” Phil says, smiling cheekily up at Dan. “I’ll initiate it.”  
-  
When dusk approaches, the sun dusting the sky with oranges and reds and pinks and purples, Dan realises he has to go. Phil looks so crestfallen that Dan half-wants to stay and move in with Phil, fuck whatever their parents say, but he knows he can’t. He’s got to do his duty to the country.

“I’ll text you,” he says. Phil nods mutely.

“See you soon?” he says hopefully. Dan nods.

“See you soon,” he promises, pressing his lips to Phil’s one last time and lingering a little longer than he’d intended before he has to get up, leave Phil Lester sitting on the forest floor staring after him dejectedly and walk back to the castle, back to the life where he’s not meant to know Phil.   
-  
The car journey back to London passes relatively uneventfully. William’s opted to stay in the castle by the border a little while longer, because George has got some illness and they’ve decided to go home early Monday morning instead. Harry and Louis are deep in discussion about politics, sensing that Dan would rather be left alone. Dan’s been texting Phil for the past two and a half hours, and his phone buzzes once again in his hands as he stares out of the window at Trafalgar Square.

I bet your castles are nicer than mine, it reads. Dad’s put me in a room with no central heating. Welcome to Wales. Dan snorts.

Doubt it, he replies. If Dad could find a way to get rid of central heating just for me, he would.

I think my dick’s shrivelling up, is the immediate response. Dan smirks.

Soon you’ll have a vagina.

Oh God, this is all part of my parents’ plan, isn’t it? Freeze my dick off then make me procreate?

You’d make a hot girl. Dan’s grinning at his phone now.

You want my boobs.

No word of a lie.

The car stops and the three princes get out, following their mother and father up the steps into the main building.

“Come on,” Harry whispers in Dan’s ear. “White.” Dan nods acutely to show he’s acknowledged what Harry’s told him, and leans forwards to whisper the same message in Louis’ ear. Louis nods too, flicks a glance over at his mother and father and ensures they’re deep in conversation before diverting to the left and following a corridor that conceals a secret passageway leading to the white drawing room. The three princes tumble into the passageway and stumble blindly along, punctuated only by Harry’s mutterings of we should have put a fucking light in here, before emerging at the other end in the white drawing room, Harry’s favourite. He quickly picks up the key from behind an ornate clock and locks the door before turning to his two younger brothers with a sad smile.

“I miss it here, y’know,” he says. “I miss you two.”

“I miss you too,” Dan and Louis say wistfully.

“Should I move back in?” Harry asks. Dan snorts.

“As if Mum and Dad would let you.”

“Er, have you seen the size of this place?” Harry says. “As if they’d know.” It’s a fair point – Dan still gets lost sometimes – but he shakes his head.

“Wish you could, though,” Louis says longingly. Harry sighs, flopping down on one of the gold silk chairs.

“Wish I could, too,” he says. “Then again, the overdone décor is enough to put anyone off.” He throws a disgusted glance around the room, and Dan has to agree – all the gold and gild and ornate furniture can be a bit too much, sometimes, especially when thrown together.

“Have you thought about how you’re gonna see Phil again?” Louis asks. Dan shakes his head.

“I have literally no idea,” he says. “I want to see him, obviously, but how am I gonna manage it?”

“Run away?” Harry suggests. “They can hardly miss you, in a place like this.”

“It’s stupid,” Dan says after a moment. “I mean, I’ve known him like a day.”

“Love’s stupid, Dan,” Harry sighs. Dan’s blood runs cold.

“It’s not love, Harry,” he says. “It’s been a day.”

“Maybe not yet,” Harry replies, sounding wiser than usual.

“Not ever.”

“Don’t be so narrow-minded,” Louis pipes up. “If you end up loving him, you end up loving him. Simple as.” Dan laughs humourlessly.

“Not simple as, Lou. If it were simple as I’d be able to like, fall in love with him and marry him and live together. But we can’t because of who we are and what we are and-“ he breaks off, swallowing thickly. He fucking hates being a prince.

“Dad won’t be King forever,” Louis reminds him gently. “When Will’s in, you’ll be fine.”

“Dad’s a power-hungry bastard,” Dan says bitterly. “Wouldn’t surprise me if he stays alive until he’s a hundred and fifty, just to see Charles die before him. He’s alive out of spite.”

“I wish I could make it easier for you,” Harry says unhappily. “Maybe Dad’ll let you go down to the border a little?” All of them know that’s a lost cause. Maybe Dan won’t ever see Phil again. Maybe it was just a one-time thing.

It didn’t feel like a one-time thing, though, and Dan doesn’t want it to be.

“What about when you’re of age?” Louis asks. “They can’t stop you then.”

“Public image,” Dan says unhappily. “They can bar me from the castle, or whatever.” Dan’s phone buzzes in his pocket and he pulls it out without even thinking about it.

Got a bit of a surprise for you. Dan frowns.

What is it?

Has your dad not told you?

I’m not with him.

Ah, well. I think you should find out from him.

“Phil says he’s got a surprise for me that I should find out from Dad,” Dan says, confused. Harry and Louis look equally perplexed, but the situation is resolved when there’s a humungous roar from downstairs. Harry’s face clears.

“Oh, it’s going to be something to do with the Lesters, isn’t it?” he says gleefully. “Maybe we’re going back down to the border.” Dan’s heart jumps. Maybe.

“Daniel! Henry! Louis!” Their father’s voice is loud enough to carry through half the palace, and they all wince at the sound of his voice.

“Unlock the door,” Louis hisses at Harry, and Harry barely manages to get the door open before he’s jumping back as his father slams it open and strides in, looking angrier than Dan’s ever seen him before.

“What are you doing in here?” he bellows.

“Talking,” Louis says defensively, “what’s it to you?”

“Louis Alexander Howell, I refuse to be spoken to in that manner,” King Edward hollers. Louis stares at him defiantly, but as soon as his father’s gaze has shifted from him Dan hears him mutter a quick well soz under his breath and has to fight back a smile.

“I have news,” the King says after a moment, seeming to recompose himself a little. “The Lesters are coming to stay.”

“The what?”

“What?”

“Bloody hell.”

“It is a shock, yes,” their father says, and Dan watches his fists clench by his side, “but we must be hospitable. Well. As hospitable as is strictly necessary.”

“Why are they coming?” Harry wants to know.

“For the hundredth anniversary of the signing of the peace treaties,” King Edward says disdainfully. “All the families involved are congregating in London for a ceremony. It had slipped my mind that the Lesters would be amongst those having to stay at Buckingham Palace.”

“Hang on,” Dan says slowly. “That’s next week, isn’t it?”

“Indeed.” The King’s pursed lips make his view on the matter all too clear.

“So, when’re they coming?” Louis asks, nudging Dan surreptitiously. Dan scowls.

“The ceremony happens to be on Friday, and all the guests begin arriving on Wednesday to give them some time to settle down. I, however, have secured it so the Lesters are only arriving on Thursday. I do not desire to be in their presence for any longer than I must.” Harry opens his mouth to say something, but they’re interrupted by a shrill voice from down the corridor.

“Edward! Edward, I need to call my designers. I need to get a better dress than Elizabeth by Thursday, and an even more glorious one for Friday. Where’s my tiaras?” Their father throws them all one last fleeting look before swishing back out of the drawing room, and the brothers wait a good three minutes before speaking again.

“There you go!” Harry says, beaming at Dan who’s feeling (and probably looking) rather shell-shocked. “That’s only half a week! You’ll see him in four days!”

“No funny business,” Louis says, but his eyes are crinkled at the corners because he’s happy for Dan. Dan still can’t really take it in. He’d completely forgotten that the hundredth anniversary of the treaty was coming up (although he’s not sure he was ever told in the first place – fucking Caroline) and certainly forgotten that the Lesters would be amongst those invited to attend.

“Oh, bollocks,” Harry says suddenly, staring at a chair. “The Irish and the Northern Irish will be there.”

“I think Dad and Charles will take centre stage,” Louis says.

“Or Dan and Phili- Phil.”

“Shut up,” Dan says, but it’s mild and there’s no heat behind the words because he’s too busy grinning.  
-  
Dan and Phil text virtually non-stop throughout the week, getting more and more excited and frantic as the build-up to the anniversary begins. There are people cleaning the palace from top to bottom every day, the clock-winders are running around with their iPhones checking all the clocks are right and the princes have generally become a total nuisance to everybody. Harry’s elected to stay with them because he said there was no point in him leaving only to come back three days later (Dan, who knows Harry’s primary residence is in Chelsea, suspects it’s something to do with missing Dan and Louis a little). William shows up on Tuesday, with a slightly healthier George in Kate’s arms, and she immediately shakes him off and tells him to go and ‘play’ with his younger brothers, something which she earns a soft swat on the arm from Dan for.

Guests began arriving on Wednesday, the Irish being the first to arrive right in the middle of the changing of the guard, which had made things slightly awkward. They’d waited outside, though, respectfully, and King Edward had welcomed them with an icy attempt at warmth. The Scottish were next, exclaiming cheerfully at how warm the castle was and how none of theirs were warm at all (to which Harry had rolled his eyes and said because you live in Scotland under his breath), and they received a much warmer welcome from the King and his Princess. Then the Northern Irish had graced the palace with their presence, keeping a cold distance from the Irish and mingling happily with the Scottish. Dan had taken pity on the Irish, whom he’d never really had anything against, and had gone over and socialised with them, receiving a hearty welcome in response and a glare from his father.

(But public image is everything, so he doesn’t say anything to Dan.)

Dan texts Phil saying he wishes Phil were here already, and Phil says that he wishes it too because his parents have already made him pack and unpack twice only to tell him that a maid is going to pack for him instead. Dan asks what Phil’s mother will be wearing, and Phil says he neither knows nor cares, but it won’t outdo Dan’s mother. Dan’s horribly disappointed.

Wednesday night passes in a flurry of cocktails and fake laughter before everyone is shown to their bedrooms and Dan flops down, seeming to wake up as soon as he’s fallen asleep only to find it’s Thursday morning, bright and early, and Phil’s coming today. He’s far more excited than he can justifiably be, but that doesn’t really matter.

He’s jittery and nervous all day, toying with his phone and showering twice in case he smells and curling his hair around his fingers only to have to straighten it again. Harry and Louis are off pissing off their parents by being friendly to the Irish, and William’s playing peacekeeper and being equally amiable to everyone. He passes Dan on his way to a posse of the Scottish, and squeezes his shoulder reassuringly.

Nearly there, Phil texts him at quarter to seven. Dan struggles to keep his breathing under control as butterflies start up in his stomach again. He really needs to pee, now, but he doesn’t know if he’ll make it to the toilet and back in time. Fucking hell.

Nervous, Dan replies.

Same, Phil fires back instantly. Gate now, be there soon. Dan doesn’t bother replying because Phil probably can’t get on his phone right now anyway, he’s probably walking up the steps and- and yeah, there’s a butler coming to talk to his father, let him know the Lesters are on their way, and King Edward throws a glance at Dan before beckoning for him.

“Get your brothers and go to the Entrance Hall,” he says quietly. “The Lesters are here.” Dan nods mutely, stepping back and finding Harry and Louis amongst the Irish crowd, nudging them both and telling them what his father had just said. William’s already on his way, having spotted the three, and they join up as they turn left out of the ballroom and begin the descent down the stairs to the entrance hall.

“Don’t be nervous,” William says lowly to Dan. “You have nothing to be nervous for.” Dan nods, knowing it’s true, but he can’t stop the butterflies rampaging around in his stomach.

They reach the entrance hall far too early for Dan’s liking, but the Lesters aren’t there yet and they have to make a good first impression.

“Quick,” their father hisses, already donning his best suit and Princess Elena her nicest evening gown, and the four boys hastily get in age order behind their parents. There are a few tense moments where Dan wants nothing more than to go to the toilet or have the ground swallow him before the great doors are pushed open by a butler and the Queen, Prince Charles and Crown Prince of Wales are announced. Charles and Elizabeth walk through the door, Charles in a William Hunt suit (Dan bites his tongue) and Elizabeth in a beautiful evening gown that certainly outshines what Princess Elena is wearing. Dan wishes he were able to see the look of cold fury on her face.

They walk all the way to about five metres from where King Edward and his wife are standing before Dan spots Phil trailing awkwardly in a suit behind them. Their eyes meet, and they share the briefest of shy smiles before they have to avert their gazes, be professional. Being royal is a job, after all.

“Your Majesty,” King Edward says stiffly, bowing to Queen Elizabeth. “Your Royal Highness,” he continues, bowing to Prince Charles in an even stiffer manner. “Your Royal Highness,” he concludes, bowing to Phil. Princess Elena does the same, murmuring her welcomes with the tiniest of curtsies, and the four princes mimick them.

“Your Majesty,” Dan says when it’s his turn, bowing deeply to Queen Elizabeth and straightening to see her smiling. “Your Royal Highness,” he continues with Prince Charles, bowing so low he stoops. Louis stifles a snort. “Yo-Your Royal Highness,” he ends, cursing himself for stuttering as he bows to Phil, meeting his gaze on the way up. The Lesters imitate them, Queen Elizabeth’s curtsey to Princess Elena almost outdoing Prince Charles’ bow to King Edward, and then it’s time for them to proceed.

They proceed back through to the ballroom, the two families peeling away from each other immediately as if they’re allergic to one another. The Lesters head off to the Irish clan, following rather snootily in Harry and Louis’ footsteps, whilst William goes back to wherever he was and the King and his wife go to the Scottish and Northern Irish. Phil hangs back a little, though, as does Dan, and they share stolen gazes for a few minutes accompanied by shy smiles that make Dan really, really want to get out of here and take Phil somewhere a little more private. It’s odd seeing him in the palace, though, the face that, before the weekend, he’d only ever seen in pictures standing in an expensive suit and looking timidly incongruous.

“If you dare talk to them…” Dan’s fathers voice sounds in his ear, gritted out and harsh, and Dan tears his gaze away from Phil, mortified that he’s been caught.

“Am I talking to them?” Dan retorts hotly, embarrassment turning to anger. “I’m standing here by myself.”

“It was merely a reminder,” King Edward says, but judging by the tone of his voice it was definitely more of a threat than anything else. He saunters away, leaving his second-youngest son scowling in his wake.

Dan doesn’t dare get too close to Phil or look at him too often again for fear of his father watching him without him knowing. He hopes Phil won’t take it personally, and he’s pretty sure he can make it up to Phil later anyway. He smiles involuntarily at the thought.

The Northern Irish are the first to retire, followed shortly by the Irish and the Lesters. The Scottish say they can go all night, if needs must, and judging by the way the alcohol’s flowing they really can. When William makes his excuses, the other three Howell brothers are quick to follow, each flitting to their rooms with a mild desperation and fatigue from having two of such parties two nights in a row (tomorrow holds another one, too, which will be extravagant and far too expensive).

Dan pulls his phone out of his pocket as soon as he’s out of sight of his father, seeing he has three texts and hurrying along to his bedroom as he types out a message to Phil.

What room are you in?

A blue one, portrait of Henry IX on the wall, gilded, comes the static reply, and Dan grins as he realises his father’s put the Lesters on the complete opposite side of the building to the Howells. Good. Nobody will suspect a thing.

He leaves his bedroom, pulling out a key and locking the door before heading to the portrait of Elizabeth I that conceals the secret passageway that tunnels straight through the building all the way to the East Wing, where Phil’s being housed. It takes a few minutes to get there (mainly because in his anxiously overexcited state Dan’s tripping everywhere) but he emerges on the other side mostly bruise-free, scurrying along two more corridors until he finds the bedroom he thinks Phil’s in.

He knocks tentatively with bated breath, but the eye that peeks through the crack in the door that opens is the unfamiliarly familiar shade of azure that Dan’s somehow grown accustomed to in a few days. The door opens wider when Phil realises it’s Dan, and Dan grins at him.

“Hey,” he says, “can I come in? It’s just, y’know, I don’t really want anyone seeing me here.” Phil nods, stepping aside to allow Dan in, and no sooner has he shut the door and Dan turned around than their lips are on each others, kissing hungrily like they’re a married couple who haven’t seen each other in years.

“Fuck,” Dan says breathlessly when they break apart, and Phil huffs out a laugh.

“Yeah,” he says, and Dan knows that Phil knows what he means. Fuck, they shouldn’t be feeling like this after half a week. Fuck, this is so wrong. Fuck, nothing’s ever felt better than kissing Phil.

“So, d’you like the palace?” Dan jokes, moving away to lie on the bed. Phil lies next to him.

“Well, bearing in mind that back home we’ve only got dingy old castles, this is a welcome change,” Phil says, and Dan’s lips quirk up in a grin.

“Well, see how you find it after tomorrow’s ceremony and afterparty,” Dan says. Phil snorts.

“The ceremony, right,” he says mournfully. “I’ve got to sign something, apparently, since I’m the heir.”

“Oh, what fun,” Dan says. “Been practicing your best cursive, have you?”

“Calligraphy, more like,” Phil says. “I’m a classy bitch.”

“See, the fact that you’re calling yourself a bitch does you no favours,” Dan says. Phil scowls up at the overhanging curtains.

“What favours would I be doing myself if I didn’t call myself a bitch?” Dan turns his head to the right, grinning at Phil.

“Sexual ones,” he tells him, and Phil turns his head to glower at Dan, although there’s a hue of thrill in his blue eyes.

“You wish,” Phil says sarcastically.

“You wish,” Dan retorts, loving the way the flicker of arousal flits through the eyes he’s grown to love so much. Phil scowls again.

“You’re so rude to me,” he exclaims. “We’re bringing this Howell/Lester feud down a generation.”

“We so are,” Dan agrees. “And you’re going down.”

“I think not,” Phil says indignantly. “We won our independence, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, by our kindness,” Dan reminds him. “You lost the bloody war you started.”

“Hey, don’t blame me,” Phil says.

“Never said I was,” Dan replies. Phil grins at him, leaning forwards slightly so their noses are brushing against one another.

“I always wondered what you’d be like, Daniel James Howell,” Phil murmurs after a moment. “If you’d be a stuck-up brat. I never once imagined I’d be in bed with you.” Dan splutters for a moment.

“You’re not in bed with me, I’m not that easy-“

“You so a-“

“I am no-“

“Filthy lia-“

“At least that’s the only thing that’s fil-“ Dan’s hot reply is cut off by Phil kissing him hungrily, effectively silencing him with a smirk. Dan struggles for a few seconds before grudgingly melting into the kiss, allowing Phil to deepen it and kissing him back. Phil pulls away, taking a few seconds to simply smirk at Dan before he’s kissing along Dan’s jaw, getting dangerously close to his neck- and then he’s kissing Dan’s neck, darting his tongue out and tracing delicate patterns across the hypersensitive skin and Dan can’t help it because fuck, and he moans and gasps and grinds against Phil, barely noticing that he’s already hard as Phil nips at his neck, soothing the spot with his tongue.

“Oh, fuck, Phil,” Dan moans weakly, tipping his head back as far as he can to allow Phil better access. He’s glad they’re lying down, because in any more upright position his knees would give out. Phil doesn’t find it as comfortable, though, because he’s detaching himself from Dan’s neck to a whine from Dan before straddling him, rolling his eyes at Dan’s needy mewls and kissing him to make him shut up before moving back to his neck again. Dan gasps, the weight of Phil’s hot body over his crotch sending shivers down his spine, and gives in to the sharp spikes of arousal telling him to get more of that, get more friction. He grinds up against Phil just as Phil grinds down, and both of them moan at the same time at the feeling of their hardened cocks brushing against each other.

“Fuck,” Phil grits out, running his tongue along Dan’s pulse point as he ruts against Dan shakily. Dan can feel how hard Phil is against him and it’s turning him on so much he can’t fucking think straight.

“Shit,” Dan moans in agreement, throwing his head back and letting his eyes flutter shut as he grinds against Phil again. This is so stupidly unsexy in the most sexy way, he thinks, knotting his hands in Phil’s silky hair as he hisses out a breath at Phil’s moan. “Shit, I’m-“

“Same,” Phil says breathlessly, but it’s Dan who comes first, Dan who arches his back and presses their cocks together as he gasps out Phil’s name amongst a string of swear words. He vaguely registers Phil stiffening and moaning something garbled, but he’s too busy coming down from his high to really acknowledge that he’s just heard Philip Lester come.

He opens his eyes after a while, grinning at Phil as Phil rolls off him, grimacing.

“Fuck,” he says, breathing still laboured. “That was- you’re so-“ He can’t even put it into words.

“I feel gross,” Phil proclaims, and Dan huffs out a laugh.

“Me too,” he admits, pulling a face as he shuffles around a little, because fuck, coming in his pants is not the nicest thing.

“I’m taking these off,” Phil says, kicking off his trousers and boxers and replacing them with pyjamas. Dan turns away, allowing Phil some privacy which is stupid because they just fucking got off together.

“I think I left some spares in here once,” Dan mutters, getting up and wincing at the unpleasant feeling as he rummages around in some drawers. He succeeds in finding some old pyjama bottoms that he’s probably grown out of but he doesn’t care, not when he’s still kind of on his post-orgasm high.

“Hey,” Phil says softly, when they roll back into bed.

“Hey yourself,” Dan replies, grinning at how cheesy he sounds.

“Cuddle me,” Phil demands, and Dan rolls his eyes but slings an arm over Phil’s waist, pulling him closer and kissing him gently.

In the morning, this is going to feel so wrong. He’s going to have to leave in the middle of the night so as not to arouse suspicion, and he’s going to wake up alone and feel wrong. It’ll be wrong because it was Phil, wrong because they’ve only known each other a few days, and wrong because this is the second time they’ve met.

But most of all it’ll be wrong because he’ll be waking up alone.


	3. Chapter 3

Wake-up call on Friday morning is far too early for Dan’s liking (around nine a.m.). He’d stayed with Phil until Phil’s speech had become more and more impaired and his eyelids had started to close and he’d eventually fallen asleep, before pressing a kiss to Phil’s forehead and sneaking back out to his room. He’d only managed a few hours of sleep, so he’s running on nothing right now.

The ceremony isn’t until the afternoon so the Scottish and Northern Irish men accompany King Edward, William and Harry on a leisurely stroll of the grounds, whilst the Scottish and Northern Irish women fawn over Princess Elena’s dresses and tiaras. The Lesters and the Irish seem at a loss for what to do, so Dan and Louis offer to take them on a tour of the palace. The Lesters look suspicious, as if this is a ploy to trap them in the palace somehow, but the Irish are eager.

At noon, they all sit down for an ‘informal’ lunch, which merely means the men are dressed in suits rather than their military uniforms and the women have put on their second-best jewellery. The seats have been positioned so His Majesty King Edward is at the head of the table with his wife, flanked by his children, and the Lesters are right at the opposite end. Dan realises that as the table progresses, the less King Edward likes the people there (Howells, Scottish, Northern Irish, Irish, Lesters) and wonders absent-mindedly why he wasn’t placed with the Lesters. He feels his father’s eye on him a lot more during the meal as he makes polite small talk with a hearty Scotsman sitting next to him, and refuses to acknowledge him. He’s not going to look at Phil. He’s not going to let his father have the pleasure of seeing that, being able to reprimand him for it.

(There’s a fleeting moment of panic where Dan debates whether his father knows about the two of them or not, but it’s gone in a flash. King Edward wouldn’t even consider that his son could be attracted to a Lester. It would be worse than treason.)

They all stand up and say their polite goodbyes, leaving in different directions to go to their rooms and change for the event. Dan’s not surprised to find Caroline looking at him in a sharp manner when he pushes open his bedroom door, fluffing up his pillows.

“You hardly slept last night,” she fusses. Dan shrugs.

“After all that champagne?” he says evasively, removing his suit jacket. “Tell me I’ve got a nice one for the ceremony.” Caroline throws him a tired look.

“I brought you a choice of two,” she says. “Your mother was keen on the William Hunt-“ Dan makes a noise of distaste “-but I know you don’t like him, so I brought up a generic Savile Row one as well.” She gestures to the wardrobe in the corner, and Dan glances over the two of them, able to tell which is the William Hunt one immediately. It’s a fucking wedding suit, doesn’t his mother understand?

“Thanks,” he says, relieved.

“Don’t let your father know,” Caroline warns.

“Nah, I won’t,” Dan replies, making his way over and picking the suit he wants off the rack. “I’m going to change here.” He usually only changes in the bathroom because it’s one of the only times he gets to be alone with his brother (or brothers, depending on how many are in the palace at the time).

“I’ve left you your straighteners, hairbrush, foundation, lip balm and cufflinks on the table,” Caroline says, nodding towards the dressing table standing in the corner. “You know where to find me if you need anything.” Dan nods, sending another thankful glance her way as she exits, shutting the door behind her in a much more civilised manner than Dan ever has.

He dresses quickly, taking care to tuck his crisp white shirt in as far as he can as he doesn’t want to run the risk of facing his father’s wrath in front of all the important people here today, and puts his cufflinks on, trying not to pull a face as the family crest tugs heavily at his wrists. He straightens his hair quickly, having done it only a few hours ago after stepping out of the shower, and puts a light layer of foundation on (for the cameras) before applying lipbalm, pocketing it, and standing up again, straightening his suit in the wall-length mirror. He looks…well, like a bit of a pretentious dickhead, but he looks okay. It’ll suffice.

There’s a sharp rap at the door, and Dan opens it to find a footman there.

“Please proceed to the yellow drawing room, Your Royal Highness,” the footman says with a short bow, and Dan nods, sweeping the room for anything he could possibly have left behind before following the footman out, down the stairs, along endless corridors and wishing he hadn’t followed the footman out but gone his own way.

He’s one of the last to reach the green drawing room – well, one of the last men, anyway. Not a single female is in sight as the men sit up straight in their expensive suits and eye each other’s cufflinks and make stiff small talk.

“Daniel,” his father says, dressed up in his best scarlet military uniform with endless medals and buttons everywhere. Dan’s pretty sure his dad awarded himself those medals for no particular reason other than they’d look nice on his suit. “At last.”

“I see none of the women are here?” Dan says, speaking in his most polite voice. He’s sorely tempted to add something like I pray thee tell me, wherefore art they always the last? but doesn’t, because he wants to get into his dad’s good books right now.

“Beauty requires a certain shade of effort,” King Edward laughs easily. Dan bites back the are you suggesting Mum’s not pretty enough and has to spend a lot of time on herself to appear so that’s so wanting to spill from his lips. As it so happens, his mother chooses that particular moment to grace the room with her presence anyhow, and Dan has no chance to say anything because he’s too busy blinking and holding back a string of curse words as her vast quantities of diamonds reflect all the sunlight streaming into the room into his eyes.

“Christ,” Harry mutters from beside him, and Dan doesn’t even question when he turned up. Harry has a habit of doing that. “She really pulled out all the stops, didn’t she? What’s she planning for this evening, then?”

“Oh, God,” Dan groans quietly. “I don’t even want to think about that.”

It’s another half an hour before all the ladies of the families are downstairs and they’re all ready to go. King Edward and Princess Elena go in a horrifically ornate carriage, with all the others following behind them in black cars with tinted windows. As they climb into the car, Louis says to the chauffeur that if he were King, he would do the royal wave out of the carriage window and turn it into a middle finger halfway through. The chauffeur looks torn between amusement and the usual professional face. Dan tells Louis to try that line on a member of the guard.

The ride to the Houses of Parliament isn’t long (it would be shorter on foot, because of all the horrific traffic around Trafalgar Square) and before long they’re all tumbling out of the cars outside the huge building, and there are flashes blinding Dan almost as much as his mother’s jewellery had as waiting paparazzi pounce on them. Dan hides behind Harry, who grins and smirks and winks at all the cameras, even stopping to pose for one, but then they’re in the building and they’re being bowed to and addressed and ushered in by several people who lead them to a spacious room off the House of Lords where the Prime Minister is waiting, beaming at them. Then there’s another round of introductions and bows as the BBC cameras film every moment before they all take their seats in the throne-like chairs that surround the huge oak table where one piece of parchment is lying.

“We are gathered here today to remember a significant event in the histories of our countries – the signing of the Treaty of Windsor,” King Edward declares. “Our ancestors fought long and hard to achieve the peace we live in today.” There’s a delicate cough from beside Dan, and he realises Harry’s snorting into his fist. “It has been one hundred years to this day since that momentous event, and we are here to renew the treaty and celebrate the peace that stemmed from it.” Dan tunes out after that, only hearing vague words like power and harmony and togetherness.

“All the current royals and heirs apparent will sign this document, securing peace in our time,” his father announces loudly, snapping Dan out of his daydream. Dan barely has time to whisper a snide comment about his father’s poor choice of words to Harry before King Edward rises from his huge throne at the head of the room and swishes dramatically over to the table, picking up a quill (Dan actually snorts at that – fucking parchment and a quill. He catches William throwing Louis a sideways glance, a sorry-you’re-not-heir-I-know-you-want-to-feel-like-you’re-in-Harry-Potter-if-we-could-switch-I-would look) and signing the parchment with a flourish.

Dan watches as one by one the heads of state walk up and sign the parchment, eyes flickering to Phil every so often and seeing him sitting stiff and stony-faced. He looks terrified. All too soon it’s the turn of the heirs apparent, and William gets up to sign the parchment, and then all eyes are on Phil. He stands up in one fluid movement, although Dan catches a glimpse of a clenched fist, and walks elegantly from his chair to the table, picking up the quill with a slightly trembling hand and scribbling a signature before walking back to his seat. He catches Dan’s eye as he sits down, forehead creased, and Dan gives a curt nod, a barely visible smile, and Phil relaxes slightly. You did it.

It’s all over after that, and there are more goodbyes and bows as the royals and foreign politicians exit the room, are led out of Parliament and get back into the cars. There was all this hype, all the people coming and staying days earlier, for something that took maybe an hour in a secluded room in Parliament to be broadcast on BBC Parliament. That’s it; they just renewed the treaty.

They’re back at the palace in no time, in the white drawing room where the two thrones sit proudly on their pedestal, having more champagne and little canapés. It’s one of the things Dan hates most about being royal – the endless buffets and afternoon get-togethers. Nobody seems to have anything better to do, so they all mingle in large groups in the drawing room. It’s crowded enough that King Edward won’t notice if Dan disappears (although judging by the looks of things, Harry and Louis have scarpered already so maybe he will notice three of his four sons are absent), so he puts his champagne flute down and tries to catch Phil’s eye across the room, saying come with me. Phil looks up from a conversation, faltering in what he’s saying and Dan inclines his head towards the door subtly before walking out himself and waiting just outside. It’s a good few minutes of waiting, and he’s starting to think Phil’s not coming when a dusty-grey-clad figure steps out from the drawing room. Dan throws a quick glance up and down the corridor, ensuring they’re not being tailed (his father has a habit of mistrusting Dan and setting people up to spy on him) before beckoning silently to a panel in the oaken wall that conceals the passageway that leads directly to the Howell sons’ wing of the building. Phil follows him, and they don’t say a word until Dan’s locked the door of his bedroom behind him and grinned at Phil, flopping down onto the bed.

“Good ceremony,” he says. Phil raises his eyebrows and snorts derisively.

“Yeah,” he says, “good for people who didn’t have to get up in front of an audience and sign a piece of fucking parchment.” Dan giggles.

“Did you feel like you were in Hogwarts?” he asks serenely. Phil sprawls himself across the sky-blue Victorian chaise that faces Dan’s bed with a grin.

“Yep,” he says. “What house are you?”

“Slytherin,” Dan says gleefully. “You?”

“Gryffindor,” Phil says. “We’re clearly not meant to be.”

“Oh, shut up,” Dan scoffs. “Don’t tell me you don’t ship Drarry.” Phil smirks a little but says nothing, opting to lie back and stare at the fussily decorated ceiling instead. Dan lets his eyes trail over Phil’s frame, the way his suit perfectly accentuates his broad shoulders and chest and God, Dan’s never been so attracted to someone in his entire life.

“You look good in that suit,” Dan tells him honestly, pulling his shoes off.

“Thanks,” Phil says, an element of shyness back in his tone. “So do you.”

“I look good in your suit?” Dan says.

“You look good in anything,” Phil says with a shrug. “I always thought you were hot.”

“I always thought you were,” Dan says. “Well, actually, I thought you were pretty,” he amends as an afterthought. “But you’re hot too.” He doesn’t add what they’re both thinking – last night. It’s throbbing painfully in the air between them, and Dan feels like he should say something but he doesn’t want to be the one who initiates the conversation. What if it’s awkward? What if it was a mistake? They had both been half-tipsy, after all. What if Phil doesn’t actually want anything but sex from Dan?

Phil doesn’t say anything for a few moments, just blinks up at Dan’s ceiling pensively.

“Can I ask you something?” he says after a while, breaking the silence between them.

“Sure,” Dan says. Phil pauses a moment before continuing.

“What are we?”

“What?” Dan knows what he means, but he’s stalling for time. He doesn’t want to make assumptions that Phil then doesn’t want to fulfil.

“You know,” Phil says, gesturing between them. “What are we?”

“Oh,” Dan says, biting his lip. “Um. I don’t know. What do you want us to be?”

“I don’t know,” Phil says. “What do you want us to be?”

“I don’t know,” Dan says, even though he does. But it’s a stupid thought, because he’s seen Phil twice, met him five days ago, and won’t see him for an extensive period of time – if at all. And as if that isn’t enough, above all that Dan’s meant to hate him.

But then again, you don’t kiss people you hate, do you? You don’t feel butterflies when your lips touch theirs, don’t find it hard to do anything but smile when they’re around, don’t fucking orgasm with them the second time you meet.

Dan shakes the hopeful thoughts out of his head. They can’t be together, because of who they are, what they are, where they come from. They just can’t. 

“I wish it were easier,” Phil murmurs wistfully. “I wish we could be normal.”

“Me too,” Dan sighs. “Things would be a lot easier.” Phil hums in agreement, and they lapse into a melancholy silence once again.

“We could try it, y’know,” Phil says, startling Dan out of his thoughts.

“Try what?” Dan asks, having already forgotten what they were discussing.

“Us,” Phil says, and he sounds nervous. Dan bites his lip.

“Is it worth it?” he says quietly. “I mean, what if it doesn’t work out? What if this is just us being giddy and reckless teenagers, happy to finally have someone and ready to take anyone who comes along? What if someone finds out?”

“Does it feel like that to you?” Phil asks. “Does it feel like we’re being giddy and reckless, taking the first person to show any interest?” Dan hesitates before answering.

“No,” he admits, because it doesn’t. It feels natural, right, like they’re two jagged pieces of broken glass that make a perfect sheet when put together.

“We have to take chances,” Phil says. “Us being who we are, what we are, there’s always going to be a risk. But it won’t be for long, right? I mean, I’m eighteen in what, six months? And you’re…you’re going to be eighteen in ten months. So it’s not too long to hold out.” Dan sighs.

“But what if you get bored in those ten months?” he wants to know. “What if you don’t want to be with me anymore? All we can do is like, text and call and Skype or whatever anyway. We won’t see each other again for- well. For a very long time.”

“We just have to run the risk,” Phil says. “I’d rather have the risk and be with you than play it safe and constantly yearn for it.”

“Are you sure?” Dan says tiredly. He knows he’d rather be with Phil than not, but at the same time he doesn’t want to have all these risks and have to sneak around behind everyone’s backs.

“Positive,” Phil tells him.

“So…” Dan says shyly. “Are we, like…?” He trails off, unsure of how to phrase it.

“Boyfriends?” Phil offers equally timidly. Dan tries to hold back the grin that escapes at the word, tries to clamp down on the butterflies that erupt in his stomach and the tingling feeling coursing through his veins. He shouldn’t be feeling like this, not after five days. They shouldn’t be this, after five days.

But he is, and they are, and it feels so fucking good.

“Yeah,” Dan says, not even bothering to hide his grin this time. He can almost hear Phil smiling too.

“Well?” Phil prompts. “Are you gonna come kiss me?”

“I don’t think so,” Dan says, feeling the sudden urge to laugh or cry or kiss Phil until they can’t kiss any longer. There’s some shuffling and footsteps before a figure’s falling on top of Dan, pushing him back on the bed with rolled eyes and a muttered lazy bastard.

“Less of that cheek,” Dan tells him. “My house, my rules.”

“Rules were made to be broken,” Phil tells him, grinning as he kisses Dan’s scowl away.  
-  
They manage to detach themselves at around six p.m., when Phil reminds Dan that they’ve both got to get ready for the dinner tonight. Dan whines and paws at Phil’s chest, trying to get him to stay, but Phil just rolls his eyes and kisses Dan once more before hoisting himself up.

“How do I get back to my room?” he asks.

“You don’t,” Dan says, gazing at him beseechingly from the bed.

“Dan,” Phil complains. “Tell me.” Dan sighs dramatically.

“There’s a portrait of Elizabeth the First down the corridor. Pull the right side of the frame, there’s a hidden door behind it. Follow the passageway all the way down to the end, and then go down the blue corridor on your right and the green corridor on your left at the end of that. There you are.”

“How many secret passages are there in this place?” Phil wonders. “I thought there wouldn’t be many – it’s quite modern, in terms of English history.”

“Enough,” Dan says absent-mindedly. “I think some were tunnelled in the war.”

“Oh,” Phil says. “Okay, I’m going. You should wear your William Hunt suit tonight.”

“I’d rather die,” Dan tells him. Phil grins.

“We can arrange that,” he says serenely. “See you in like, half an hour.”

“Bye,” Dan says, watching Phil until the door clicks shut behind him. He sighs loudly, rolling over on his bed and staring up at the overhanging gold silk curtains that frame it, so lost in thought that he doesn’t notice the door opening again.

“Was that Prince Philip of Wales I just saw?” someone asks in a teasing tone, and Dan sits bolt upright to see Harry smirking at him.

“Fuck off,” Dan mumbles, rolling over to hide his burning face in the pillow.

“Hey, no judgement here,” Harry says easily, sitting on Dan’s bed and rolling him back over gently. “Boys are good too.”

“You’re straight.”

“Eh, more or less,” Harry says dismissively. “I came to give you your suit, but since we’re talking about Phil now, let’s continue. What was he doing here?”

“Talking to me,” Dan says. Harry raises an eyebrow. “Okay, and kissing me.”

“Nothing else? I mean, you are lying in bed, and your hair’s kind of messed up…”

“No!” Dan says hotly, but he hesitates, thinking of yesterday. Should he tell Harry? He trusts him, and he seems to have some experience in this field, and he’s been with enough people to know how Dan’s feeling (probably), so… “We did kind of, um, yesterday.” He doesn’t know how to put it.

“Did what?” Harry says, eyes sparkling.

“Er, grinding?” Dan says, searching for a word that describes it in a non-cringey way and failing.

“Oh,” Harry says, grinning. “That’s good, that is. Did you enjoy it?”

“Oh my God,” Dan says, feeling his face flush again. “Yes.”

“Wait, hang on,” Harry says with a frown. “He’s your first, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Be careful,” Harry warns. “First love is always the strongest.”

“I’m not in fucking l-“

“I’m not saying you are, just yet,” Harry says. “I’m just giving you a warning.” Dan opens his mouth to retort but thinks better of it, snapping his mouth shut and settling for glaring at Harry instead.

“We’re together,” he says after a while, and Harry’s eyes widen.

“Shit,” he says. “How’re you going to manage that?”

“I don’t know,” Dan sighs. It’s plaguing him already, and he’s wondering if he made the right decision, saying yes.

“Look, Dan,” Harry says with a sigh, ruffling Dan’s hair in that elder-brotherly way. “If you want it to work, it’ll work. I don’t know much about Phil, but I bet he wants you just as much as you want him – and not just in that way. I haven’t seen someone so head-over-heels for somebody since- well, since Will and Kate,” he says ruefully. Dan’s stomach plummets. “But if you fret over it, if you worry that it’s not meant to be or that someone will find out or that it won’t be accepted or whatever, it’ll be worse. And anyway, would it be so bad if someone found out? Would you rather have this life, the prince-palace life, or be with Phil?” Dan’s answer is immediate. Phil.

“It’s scary, I know,” Harry continues. “I mean, it’s not even been a week. But there are no rules that say you have to progress at a certain speed. If it feels right this fast, it’s right for you.”

“I’m scared,” Dan says in a small voice.

“I’m here,” Harry says, “and so’s Will, and so’s Louis. Even if things don’t work out between you, you’ve always got us.” Dan smiles at him, so fucking glad he’s got his brothers, and Harry leans down to hug him quickly.

“Now, get changed,” he says. “You’ve got about fifteen minutes before Dad sends someone knocking on your door to wrench you downstairs by the collar.”   
-  
Dinner is insanely boring, as per usual. Dan’s been seated between his mother and Louis this time, so he hasn’t got to talk to anybody. He steals furtive glances down the table at Phil whenever possible, addicted to the way his hair falls slightly into his blue eyes and the way he uses his hands when he’s making a point and the way his suit clings to his body in all the right places. Harry notices him staring from time to time and alternates between smirking at Dan with glittering eyes and grinning happily down at his food. He’s genuinely happy for Dan, and that means the world.

Dinner finishes at around nine thirty, and they head to a ballroom for a dance and some more champagne and, in Dan’s case, sneaking surreptitious looks at Phil across the hordes of people chattering and dancing and laughing. It’s the most informal Dan’s ever seen the place, but that might be because the adults have been drinking steadily through dinner and continuing afterwards in an attempt to make their present company more bearable. It’s still pretty stiff, though, with dances being regulated and scheduled and always started by the host royals (Dan’s parents).

“Oh, Daniel,” Princess Elena says to him, flopping down in a chair next to him and fanning herself. “Why don’t you have a dance?”

“Er, no thanks,” Dan says.

“There is a charming young gentleman over there, the Northern Irish one, I am sure he would say yes to you.”

“I don’t want to, thanks,” Dan mutters awkwardly, picking at the tails of his suit. He hates wearing tails.

“Well, it would be respectful as a host to dance at least once,” his mother says, turning her glare on Dan. Dan’s eyes flick to Phil involuntarily, sitting on the opposite side of the ballroom next to his own mother, who’s probably telling him to go and dance with a charming young lady.

“I’ll dance the waltz, okay?” he says, and his mother sits back, satisfied.

“Good,” she says curtly, getting up and motioning for him to do the same. Dan rolls his eyes and mutters a few curses under his breath but does so as the band strike up a waltz, the beginning few bars of which Dan has to find a partner. Everybody’s paired off already except Phil and a hunchbacked old woman from Ireland, and seeing as Dan only has a fleeting moment to choose he goes for Phil, realising only when he bows in front of Phil what a mistake he’s made, they’ve made. They’re in for it now.

“I’m sorry,” Dan murmurs as Phil takes his waist when the waltz starts properly and they begin stepping across the floor. Phil’s a skilled dancer, Dan has to admit, and they flit easily between the other couples.

“’S’alright,” Phil says. “Just stay at the other end of the ballroom, they might not notice us.”

“Where are yours?” Dan asks, peeking over Phil’s shoulder in a vain attempt to find Phil’s parents.

“Dancing near yours, trying to outdo them,” Phil replies as they turn. His grip on Dan’s waist is strong and protective, and it makes Dan want to pull Phil in by his lapels and kiss him hungrily, fuck everyone else in the room. But he doesn’t, because he can exercise some self-restraint.

“Working?” Dan asks, trying to keep his lip movements minimal. If his father sees, he’ll say he promised Mum a waltz and everyone else was taken, he didn’t want to go with Phil.

“Not outdoing us,” Phil says with a small smile as he throws Dan out to the side. Dan turns back in with a grin.

“Nobody can,” he says agreeably as they ease across the dancefloor.

Dan prises himself apart from Phil when the dance ends and walks away as stiffly as he can manage when he’s in such a good mood. His father doesn’t come over to him, though (thankfully), and Dan thinks he’s got away with it until William and Louis seat themselves either side of him. Great.

“Dangerous move,” is how Louis greets him.

“I know,” Dan says. “It was him or that hunchback Irish woman, though.”

“Dad would say go with the hunchback or don’t go at all,” Louis says.

“I promised Mum.” Louis merely shrugs.

“How are things with him?” William asks. Dan bites his lip.

“We’re together,” he confesses after a moment of inner conflict. Both William and Louis turn to stare at him.

“Congratulations!” Will says warmly.

“Did you fuck?” Louis asks bluntly. Dan chokes and squawks a little.

“No,” he says emphatically. Louis shrugs, the ghost of a smirk on his face.

“Ah, well. Comes with time.” Dan glowers at him. It still stings that his fifteen-year-old brother has seen more action than he has, and he’s not even legal yet.

“Are you sure about this, though, Dan?” William says, looking concerned. Dan sighs.

“Not really, no,” he admits. “It feels right, but…there’s so much that could go wrong, y’know? I mean, not just with him being a prince and living in Wales, but the fact that he’s a Lester…” He feels slightly nauseous at the thought of his father ever finding out. Dan’ll almost certainly be cast out of the family once he does.

“It’s a big risk you’re taking,” William says. Louis rolls his eyes.

“Less of the big-brotherliness, yeah?” he says. “Look, if Dan wants to bang a Lester, no problem. I have nothing against him.”

“You haven’t even met him yet,” Dan says through gritted teeth, narked at Louis’ crudity.

“Fair point,” Louis says with a broad grin. “How about we meet him soon? This evening, after this is over? Good,” he says, without waiting for Dan to consent. “I’ll go tell Harry.” He gets up and flounces away before Dan can say anything like fucking no, you’re not meeting my boyfriend and William sighs.

“I know you probably don’t want us to,” he says, “but I think we should meet him. Me, anyhow, since both of us will be reigning together in the future.” Dan winces.

“But Harry?” he says, thinking of how lewd his older brother can be at times. William smiles.

“I’ll take care of him,” he promises. “I’m not going to force you into anything, but if he’s not going to meet the parents, he should at least meet the brothers, right?”

“Fine,” Dan sighs. “We’ll go white, after this, okay?”

“I bet Harry and Lou are already in there,” William says wisely. Dan groans and buries his face in his hands. This is going to be a nightmare.  
-  
Dan manages to send a surreptitious text to Phil telling him to hang around outside after people start retiring, but he doesn’t know whether Phil got it or not. The guests begin leaving at around midnight, but it’s not until half past that Dan manages to get away. Phil’s outside in the corridor, gazing half-interestedly at the portraits hanging on the wall, and Dan’s stomach sinks. He’d half-wished Phil hadn’t got that text so he wouldn’t have to deal with the situation.

“Follow me,” Dan says quietly as he passes Phil, not wanting to draw attention to them. Phil gets the hint and waits until Dan’s almost at the end of the corridor before hurrying after him, so they don’t look like they’re together. It’s not long before they’re nearing the drawing room and Dan sweeps a hurried glance up and down the corridor to check it’s thoroughly deserted before telling Phil regretfully what’s occurring.

“I’m so sorry,” he says, when Phil blanches.

“They’re gonna hate me,” Phil whispers, stiffening in anxiousness. Dan puts a hand on his arm to calm him down, guilt welling up inside him. He should have said no, shouldn’t have told Phil, should have asked Phil if it was okay, should have and shouldn’t have done so many things.

“They won’t,” he says, “I promise. Will really wants to meet you because of the whole future-King thing, so…I dunno, I couldn’t say no after Lou had already buggered off to tell Harry.”

“Fuck,” Phil says quietly, looking like he’s about to throw up. “Dan, I can’t do this. I can’t- they’ll hate me, I’m sure of it. I’m a Lester, they’re Howells.”

“Phil, I’m a Howell and you fucking came on top of me last night,” Dan says, wincing slightly as he accidentally breaches the unspoken barrier they’ve created. No matter; Phil probably isn’t listening, and if he is he won’t remember. “It’ll be fine, I promise.” Phil takes a deep breath, letting his eyes flutter shut before he nods.

“Okay,” he says, sounding a little more calm. “Okay, fine.” Dan smiles at him and kisses him briefly, lingering only a moment before linking his hand with Phil’s and pushing the door to the white drawing room open. His three brothers are already sat inside, seemingly deep in an argument, but they all stop and look up as Dan kicks the door shut behind him.

“We thought you weren’t coming,” Harry says, looking up from where he’s sitting on the gold-silk-threaded chair.

“Well, coming in a certain wa-“ Louis’ final word is muffled by William’s hand.

“Sorry about him,” William says kindly. “Sit down.” Dan tugs at Phil’s hand gently and pulls them both towards the gold-silk-threaded sofa that complements the chairs the other three are sitting on.

“Is it okay if we call you Phil?” Harry asks. “I mean, we grew up calling you Philip, but.” He shrugs.

“No, it’s okay,” Phil says, grasping Dan’s hand so hard he nearly crushes it. “I- I prefer Phil, anyway.”

“Relax,” Harry tells him, grinning. “There’s no need to be scared. We don’t hate you, promise. I for one think you’re quite a looker.” Dan throws him a glare. “Although Dan doesn’t want me to think that, so I’ll pretend I don’t,” he amends, and Dan’s glare intensifies.

“What’s it like, in Wales?” Louis asks, propping his feet up on an antique table only to have William shoo his feet back off again. “Is court better than here?”

“No,” Phil says. “We don’t have central heating in our castles.”

“No way,” Louis says. “How have you still got a cock?”

“I don’t know,” Phil says, warming up a little. “I’m pretty sure I only have it during the summer months. I think I’m female for half the year.”

“I’ll get Dan to testify that for me sometime,” Louis says with a smirk, and Dan glowers at him.

“I’m sorry about my brothers,” he says loudly.

“Hey!” William protests, offended.

“Except Will,” Dan says.

“You can’t hate me for telling the truth,” Louis shrugs.

“I can hate you for a lot of things,” Dan mutters.

“Yeah, but that’s not one of them,” Louis says.

“Wanna bet?” Dan challenges.

“Are you offering?”

“Would I have asked otherwise?”

“Could’ve just been a smartass retort.”

“Wasn’t,” Dan scowls. Louis shrugs. “How much?”

“Box of condoms?” Louis offers, smirking. “You need them now, too.” Dan has the insatiable urge to throw something at Louis, like maybe a bookcase or a piano.

“We have company,” William reminds the two sternly, but when Dan flicks his gaze to Phil’s face he looks like he’s stifling laughter.

“You laughing at me?” he asks, unsure whether to be offended or not.

“Of course he is,” Harry says, “you’re ridiculous.” 

“Have we congregated here so you three can gang up on me in front of my boyfriend?” Dan exclaims.

“I think we have,” Harry says agreeably.

“Be glad you don’t have brothers,” Dan says to Phil, and Phil shrugs with a small smile.

“I’d like brothers,” he says. Harry grins triumphantly.

“See?” he says to Dan. “He likes us. You didn’t want him to know us, but he likes us. Now he’s going to leave you and date us instead.”

“Shut up,” Dan scoffs. “He can’t date three people at once. And Will’s married, anyway.”

“Accidental infidelity,” Louis pipes up.

“There’s no such thing.” Phil snorts quietly from beside Dan, and everyone turns to look at him.

“I- er, I mean, you just accidentally quoted You Me At Six,” he says nervously, and Louis stares at him.

“He even has good taste in music,” he says in a wondering tone. “Dan, I think you should marry him. Like, pronto.”

“Ah yes, let me just mention it to Dad. ‘Hey Dad, I’m going to marry Philip Lester, is that alright with you? No? Oh, too bad’,” Dan says sarcastically.

“Yep, that’ll do the trick,” Harry nods, leaning back in his chair. “He’ll be won over in no time.”

“He told me he’d castrate me if I so much as spoke to a Lester,” Dan reminds Harry.

“Yeah, let alone make out with and almost fuck,” Louis chimes in. Dan utters a low groan, pinching the bridge of his nose with his free hand. Louis is going to drive him insane.

Luckily, Phil giggles hesitantly, finding Louis amusing rather than obnoxious and rude. Louis throws him an appreciative smile.

“Someone appreciates me around here,” he says pointedly. The other three Howells stare at him.

“Go back to Wales with Phil, then,” Harry says.

“That’ll bode even better for the family ties, won’t it?” Louis says sarcastically, picking at a loose bit of gold thread. William catches his hand and pulls it away before he does too much permanent damage.

“Speaking of family ties, I should go and see how my wife and child are,” William says. “It was really nice meeting you, Phil. I hope when we’re in charge we’ll have a better relationship than that of our fathers.”

“You too,” Phil says. “Thank you.” William throws him a smile before getting up.

“I’m gonna go too,” Louis says, stifling a yawn. “It’s been a long day.”

“It has,” Harry agrees, although he doesn’t look remotely tired. “See you boys tomorrow, yeah? I mean, Phil, I probably won’t be able to say goodbye to you or anything, but hey. You’re cool.”

“Thanks,” Phil beams.

“Goodnight,” Louis says, saluting Phil, and Phil gives him a little salute back. As soon as they’re both out of the room Phil exhales deeply.

“I wasn’t too bad, was I?” he says. Dan stares at him.

“Are you kidding me? My brothers clearly love you. I bet they’ll try and swap me for you,” he says. Phil smiles shakily.

“They’re cool,” he says wistfully. “You’re lucky to have them.”

“I am,” Dan murmurs in agreement. “I’m lucky to have you too, though.”

“You’re so cheesy,” Phil says, but he’s grinning through the shake of his head.

“You love it,” Dan murmurs, kissing Phil. Phil mumbles something against Dan’s lips but Dan’s not interested, because he’s got Phil in his fucking gorgeous suit with his satin hair and beautiful eyes and everything about Phil, just everything, is making Dan want to do things to him that he’s never considered doing before.

“Fuck, you’re hot,” Dan breathes and Phil moans, slipping his tongue inside Dan’s mouth and bringing his other hand up to tangle in Dan’s hair.

“Daniel, I need you to- what on Earth is the meaning of this?” someone roars, and Dan and Phil break apart guiltily to see King Edward staring at them, his face a mask of pure white-hot fury.

Oh, shit.


	4. Chapter 4

Dan stares at his father in shock, speechless. His blood’s turned to ice, his stomach’s sinking and his heart- well, that’s long gone. He isn’t going to make it out of this room alive.

“I-“

“Kissing Philip Lester!” King Edward roars. “Daniel James Howell, were you kissing Philip Lester?”

“Dad, it’s-“

“Do not call me that!” King Edward says furiously. “No son of mine dares to speak to a Lester.”

“I guess you have no sons then,” Dan fires back, beginning to get some feeling seeping back into him after the numb, sickening shock of being found. “Harry, Lou and Will all like Phil.”

“They do not,” King Edward spits. “Explain what is going on.”

“I-“

“Explain what is going on.” He’s almost trembling with fury now, and Dan grits his teeth. All or nothing, and he’s got both.

“I was kissing Phil,” he snaps, “because he’s my boyfriend.” King Edward looks like he’s about to have a fit, pass out or both.

“Your what?!” he bellows. “How dare you? How dare you, Daniel James, take that filth upon yourself? Have I not raised you and taught you the ways of the Lesters? Did I not rear you to see the despicable filth they are? How could you betray your family – your country – like this?”

“Phil’s not even a bad person!” Dan shouts. “You can’t hate someone you’ve never met, just because you hate their parents! You can’t teach your children to hate people just because you hate them! It’s fundamentally and morally wrong, okay? I’m old enough to decide for myself who I like and who I don’t like.”

“Whilst you live in this household, under my roof and my protection, I decide that for you,” King Edward hisses dangerously. Dan stands up, clenching his fists.

“Yeah?” he says. “Well, maybe it’s time I didn’t live under your roof anymore.”

“Daniel James, you know full well that by law you are required to stay with your parents until you are of age – that is to say, eighteen. And until that day I expressly forbid any contact whatsoever with this…this boy,” King Edward says, throwing Phil a contemptuous look as he strides towards Dan. “As for now, you are not to be within sight of each other. You, I shall get someone to escort you to your room – and guard it,” he adds, throwing a look at his son as if he knows what Dan’s planning. “This is a minor blemish, but I will sort it out. You are a mistake.” With that he hauls Dan out of the room roughly by his wrist and pushes him so he staggers halfway down the corridor.

“Never let me see you near that boy again,” King Edward yells angrily. “Never, ever again.” Dan rubs at his wrist where his father’s fuming hand had been and stumbles away blindly, not hearing the rest of the angry words King Edward shouts after him as his feet lead him to his bedroom. He doesn’t think again until he’s flopped down on his bed, staring up at the gold hangings.

Fuck. They were too careless, too reckless, and it got them back. Dan was too reckless, too careless, and now he’s going to get Phil in trouble too. He shouldn’t have said yes; they were a bad idea, a disaster waiting to happen. Dan and Phil just can’t be, and he has to learn to accept that. They’re too wrong to be right.

He ignores all the thoughts that are telling him it’s his father that’s wrong, Dan and Phil that are right, and rolls over to go to sleep.

He doesn’t want to wake up.  
-  
As it is, he does wake up, at around noon the next day when someone strokes his cheek gently. Dan’s eyes flutter open and he squints through his eyelashes, fighting the light to see who’s by his bed. It’s Harry.

“Hey,” he says softly. “Dad…told us.” Dan says nothing, the sinking feeling settling in the pit of his stomach again, and closes his eyes. “We fought.”

“You shouldn’t have,” Dan mumbles and he means it. He doesn’t want his brothers to get in more trouble for something that doesn’t concern them in any way. 

“It was a long time coming,” Harry says with a short shrug. “He told me I have to get out and leave if I support you in this.”

“See?” Dan says.

“I left six years ago, Dan,” Harry says. “It doesn’t affect me.”

“Still.” Dan’s not really in the mood for polysyllabic words right now. He’s not in the mood for anything. He’s not even in a mood; he’s just dull, numb, empty.

“Look,” Harry says, sighing as he ruffles Dan’s hair. “We’re here for you, okay? Lou, Will and me. We’re not going to leave you just ‘cause Dad doesn’t approve. We love you, we like Phil, and we’d rather you guys were happy than be part of this…family.”

“But Will’s gonna be King,” Dan says. “He won’t give that up.”

“Dad can’t outlaw him from being heir,” Harry says. “Or, well, I don’t think so. But what’s he going to do? If he outlaws all of us from being heirs, who’s left?”

“Beatrice,” Dan says. Harry wrinkles his nose.

“She’s not part of Dad’s direct line. Dad’s too proud to let his family lose the throne. Look, Dad won’t do anything drastic. He’ll just pretend it never happened to get you over it.”

“I don’t want to pretend it never happened,” Dan mumbles. “I want it to still be happening.”

“I know,” Harry says with a sigh. “I know, and I’m sorry we can’t do much about it right now. But I promise you, we’ll try our best.” He sounds so earnest that Dan actually almost smiles.

“Thank you,” he whispers.

“You’re my brother,” Harry shrugs, but he’s hiding his bashful happiness. “I’d do anything to see you happy.”  
-  
King Edward doesn’t talk to Dan all day. Phil’s already gone by the time Dan extracts himself from his bed and makes his way downstairs, and Dan pulls out his phone to see several missed calls and texts from him. He hasn’t got the heart to answer them, though, so he pockets it again to check back later.

Louis catches up with him when he makes his excuses after lunch and goes back upstairs.

“You sound utterly miserable,” he says bluntly, perching on the edge of Dan’s bed. Dan sighs.

“I am,” he admits. It’s stupid, because he shouldn’t be, and it’s all his fucking fault really, but he is. He feels hopeless.

“Come on, d’you really think something like Dad’s gonna stop you?” Louis says.

“How’s it not?” Dan asks. Louis shrugs.

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” he says. Dan sighs again.

“I’ll be disowned,” he says dully. “And so will the lot of you, if you don’t stop meddling.”

“We’re not meddling, Dan,” Louis says. “We’re here to help you.”

“I know, but I don’t want-“

“We can decide for ourselves what we want,” Louis interrupts. “If we’d rather see you happy than be in the family, so be it. You can’t make that decision for us.”

“Louis…” Dan begins warningly.

“No, shut up, Dan,” Louis says fiercely. “You always put us first, and now it’s our turn to put you first, okay? I’m fifteen, I’m old enough to know what I’m doing. Harry’s twenty-four, and Will’s twenty-eight; they know too. We’re in this together.” Dan doesn’t know what to say to that.

“Thank you,” he says eventually. Louis smiles, reaching out and curling his little finger with Dan’s, like they used to when they were children and Louis was scared.

“What are brothers for?” he says.   
-  
William catches Dan after dinner, and Dan starts to wonder whether he has some kind of post-food brother-magnetism he doesn’t know about.

“Hey,” William says.

“Hi,” Dan sighs. “Don’t tell me you’re in it as well.”

“In what?” William frowns.

“This- this scheme, or whatever, that Harry and Lou have implemented about fighting back against Dad’s constraints or- or whatever,” Dan says, waving a hand vaguely. William frowns for a moment, before his face clears into a small smile.

“Well, when you put it like that,” he says, and Dan groans.

“Look, I appreciate the gesture,” he says, as they turn into the entrance hall. “But honestly, I’ll survive. I’ve endured Dad’s wrath before, I can endure it again.” It’s a little different this time, though, because it’s over something he’s had that he’s already missing even though he shouldn’t be.

“Really?” William says. “Dan, we all know you’re not the best at dealing with things.”

“What’s that meant to mean?” Dan says defensively. William bites his lip, as if he’s not sure whether he should speak or not, before shaking his head. Dan thinks his eyes flit to Dan’s wrist for the briefest of moments and a sharp stab of panic runs through him as the silvery, faded scars sear white-hot. He can’t know. And anyway, it’s all in the past. He made it out alive. 

“You were happy with Phil,” William says. “You are happy with Phil.”

“I don’t think we’re together anymore,” Dan mumbles, although he hasn’t actually spoken to Phil about it. He’s dreading opening those texts to see sorry, I don’t think we should be together.

“Have you spoken to him about it?” William says, and Dan shakes his head.

“But after what Dad said…”

“What did he say?”

“I’m not allowed to have any form of contact with Phil,” Dan says. “He’s probably going to regulate my phone.”

“And if he does that, I’ll buy you a new phone,” William says. “I’ll keep buying you new phones until he stops.”

“That’s a waste of taxpayers’ money.”

“Is it?” William says, grinning. Dan looks at him suspiciously.

“What are you hiding?” he says. William’s grin broadens.

“You haven’t seen the papers?” he says. Dan frowns, shaking his head. Oh God, what’s in them? Some godawful piece about Dan – or, more likely, Harry?

(Dan still hasn’t quite figured out how Harry’s managed to become the nation’s sweetheart after all his misgivings and bad decisions in life. He attributes it to Harry’s likeability, but can’t help wondering if Harry’s slept with every newspaper editor ever in order to get good press. He wouldn’t be surprised.)

“Oh,” William says, full-on smirking now. “I think you should see.” He calls a passing footman over and asks him to fetch the Sun (“Oh, shit, did Harry’s Vegas pictures make page three?” Dan asks. William fixes him with a how funny glare) and they walk into a nearby bedroom to wait for him to return.

It’s only a few minutes before he’s back, bowing and offering them the two papers. William takes them from his white-gloved hands, thanking him before turning back to Dan with the most self-satisfied smirk Dan’s ever seen.

“Here you go,” he says, handing Dan the newspaper, and Dan grabs it from him, scanning the front page.

Affair Apparent – Phil & Dan

Dan snorts before even reading further – that’s not even a good pun. Nobody who didn’t know what an heir apparent was would know that was even a pun, and half the Sun’s readers only buy it for page three.

Prince Philip of Wales and Prince Daniel were seen exchanging hot glances at yesterday’s ceremony to mark the hundredth anniversary of the Treaty of Windsor. Prince Daniel is fourth in line to the English throne after his two elder brothers and his nephew, and Prince Philip is the heir to the throne of Wales. The two countries have been on uncomfortable terms since the war, as have the Howell and Lester families, but it seems the younger Howell and Lester may be settling their disputes some other way.

The rest of the article talks about the glances Dan and Phil had exchanged at the ceremony and wonders if they’ll see the first royal gay marriage. It’s a peculiarly positive article, saying that it’s time the Howells and Lesters got over their disputes and that they’d back the two of them in a relationship. Dan curses himself as he reads on - of course he ceremony wouldn’t have been broadcast on BBC Parliament; it’s far more important than that, what with all the royals and the hype about it being one hundred years. That would be broadcast on no other than BBC One. And people would have spotted the way Dan’s gaze had kept wandering to Phil, and the way he’d nodded and smiled at Phil after Phil had signed.

Sure enough, accompanying the curiously literate article (for the Sun) is a grainy picture of Dan and Phil, eyes locked. Dan’s pretty sure that particular gaze can’t have lasted more than half a second, but the way the paper’s printed it, cropping everyone else out, has made it seem like they were gazing at each other in a lovesick manner.

“Has Dad seen this?” Dan asks dully. William nods, taking the paper back off Dan.

“But he already knew,” he says dismissively. “My point is, nobody cares. People think it’s great. I bet people’ll start shipping you soon.” Dan groans.

“Please don’t tell me you know about shipping,” he says.

“I know all about it,” William says with a grin, eyes twinkling. “Lou and I already decided what your ship name with Phil would be.”

“Great,” Dan says, really not wanting to hear it.

“Phan,” William announces. “It’s so good, right, because you can use it in any context. I’m a phan of yours. I think you’re phantastic. There’ll be phanfiction. It’s brilliant.”

“Wonderful,” Dan growls. That’s just what he wants. “The papers aren’t even right.”

“When are they?” William says. “The press has freedom, though. We can’t do anything about it. Anyway, it was good press.”

“Is that why Dad’s not kicked me out yet?” Dan asks.

“Probably,” William says honestly. “But now he knows that the nation’s on your side, he can hardly kick you out anyway.”

“Fuck,” Dan says. “I don’t- fuck.” He doesn’t know what to think about it. On the one hand, it’s good that he’s not being made homeless. On the other hand, he wants to be with Phil. And on yet another hand, he’s not sure he even wants the nation to know. He likes secrets.

“It’s not the most ideal situation, I know,” William says. “But it’s better than the nation hating you, right?”

“Right,” Dan mumbles, almost certain they’ll turn on him at some point.

“Anyway, Harry said he’s going to leak a little about how much he wants you to be happy. There’s never bad press where Harry’s involved.”

“Yeah,” Dan says, feeling a little better. If the nation knows Harry’s on his side, they won’t dare say anything against him. Everyone loves Harry a little too much.

“Look,” William says quietly. “We’re not going to let Dad win this. He’s being stupid, we can all see that, letting prejudice cloud his judgement. We’ll find a way.”

“Yeah,” Dan says again, smiling at William. “Thanks, y’know. For…well, everything.”

“You’re welcome,” William says, ruffling his hair. Dan scrunches his nose, squawking in protest. He’s just done his hair. “I’d die for my brothers.”  
-  
It’s gone midnight when Dan works up the courage to check his texts. He now has twelve missed calls from Phil and six texts from him, so he erases the calls first before reading the texts.

Hope your dad wasn’t too mad.

Sorry, we left really early, didn’t have time to say goodbye

Dan?

Dan, are you ignoring me?

It’s okay if you don’t want us to be together anymore. You just have to say; I’d rather you said than ignored me.

Dan??

Dan immediately feels guilty for putting off reading them for the whole day. Phil’s probably been worried sick about it.

Hey, sorry, busy day he types out. It’s not really a lie – they’d had to see off the Northern Irish and the Irish before lunch, and the Scottish after dinner – but he’d had time enough, and the guilt weighs heavy and leaden in his stomach.

That’s alright. Can I call you? Dan checks his door is locked before sending back an affirmative, and it’s barely three seconds before Phil Lester is flashing on Dan’s screen. He bites his lip, hesitating a few seconds before pressing accept.

“Dan?” Phil’s voice is tinny, nothing like as soft and low it is in real life. It makes Dan’s heart ache a little.

“Yeah, hi,” Dan says. “Sorry I didn’t answer your texts, we had to say goodbye to everyone and stuff.” It’s vague, and it’s a half-truth, but it’ll suffice.

“That’s okay,” Phil says, sounding slightly subdued. “We need to talk.”

“Yeah,” Dan says, sighing. “We do.”

“Are you mad at me?” Phil asks in a small voice. Dan frowns.

“What? No, why would I be mad at you?” he asks. There’s a pause, and Dan knows Phil’s biting his lip and shrugging.

“I dunno, people always get mad at me,” he says. The guilt feels like an anvil now.

“No, of course I’m not mad at you,” Dan reassures him.

“Good,” Phil says, relief apparent in his voice. “Is your dad?”

“Livid,” Dan tells him. “But he hasn’t spoken to me since yesterday, so that’s alright.”

“God, I’m sorry,” Phil says. “I- fuck, I’m so sorry, I should never have asked you to-“

“It’s fine,” Dan says. “Seriously. I’d rather he didn’t speak to me. I hate him.” The words are strong, but Dan realises with sudden consciousness that they’re true. He has no love for his father.

“Still,” Phil says. They lapse into contemplative silence, each thinking about his own thing – or in Dan’s case, fretting. They still haven’t talked about whether they’re going to stay together or whether it’s best to not bother (which it is), and he’s starting to worry that Phil doesn’t want to be the one to say sorry, I don’t want to be with you anymore.

“Do you still want to be together?” Dan blurts after a while, biting his lip as soon as the words have left his mouth.

“Do you?” Phil asks, deflecting the question back at Dan.

“I asked you first,” Dan says, and Phil sighs.

“If you do,” he says.

“Give me a straight answer,” Dan says. He doesn’t want to force Phil into anything out of pure politeness or awkwardness at saying no.

“Personally, yeah,” Phil says quietly. “I- fuck, I don’t- I can’t- yeah, I wanna be with you. A lot. More than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.”

“Same,” Dan admits, the pressure in his chest lifting slightly at those words. Phil actually wants to be with him; more than he’s ever wanted anything in his life. Seventeen years is a long enough time to want many different things, and Dan being top of that list means that what they’ve got isn’t just some stupid little crush.

“Good,” Phil says, and his smile is almost audible. Dan realises that he’s smiling too, and lets the relief that Phil still wants to be with him flood him, wash over him, fill him until his smile’s a grin and he’s biting his lip to stop it.

“I’m sorry,” Dan says after a pause. “I mean, that wasn’t exactly- yeah. I’m sorry.” He doesn’t really know how to put it. Sorry for kissing you in such a careless place. Sorry for my dad and his prejudiced ways. Sorry for not answering any of your texts and making you think I was ignoring you. Sorry for being me.

“It’s okay,” Phil tells him. “As long as we’re okay, it’s okay.” And Dan realises that that’s pretty much an accurate summary of their relationship, the way they are – scarily so, for such a new relationship. They could be kicked out, homeless, friendless and shunned, but as long as they’re okay, it’s okay.   
-  
Sunday passes without much noteworthy happening. Breakfast is a cool affair, with King Edward being warmer and friendlier than usual to his two eldest and his youngest sons, to accentuate the distant air he’s put on for interacting with Dan. Dan doesn’t care much, though, glad to not have insults thrown at him every third minute for his shambolic appearance and lazy speech. He leaves the table early without an excuse, merely a muttered ‘’scuse me’ which his mother stares at him disapprovingly for but he can’t bring himself to care about. The rest of the day is spent lounging around in the palace, because he doesn’t have much to do now it’s the holidays, being a young prince. He texts Phil and calls him and masturbates a bit (a lot), but nothing interesting happens.

Harry leaves on Sunday morning with a promise that he’ll be back soon, no matter what Dad says. He is only in Chelsea, after all, and he tells Dan that if he wants to get out of the palace, he’s always welcome there. Dan smiles and tells him he appreciates it, and he might be there later on tonight. Harry grins and tells Dan he hoped he’d say that.

William leaves on Sunday evening to go back to his Hampshire home, but he promises Dan that if Dan ever wants him to go back to the palace he’ll come back and he’ll stay as long as Dan needs him there. Kate nods in agreement, saying she knows the brothers come before anyone else, and even little George smiles up at Dan and waves his tiny fist in Dan’s face. Dan smiles, realising he’s barely had a moment with the baby, and Kate tells him to take George whilst they’re packing their bags (William doesn’t trust the staff, with their father in charge).

Dan picks the baby up, grinning at the excited toothless smile on his chubby face, and carries him around on his hip for a while, talking to him as if he were an adult. George doesn’t seem to mind, though, knotting his fingers through Dan’s hair and staring at it in wonder, blue eyes wide and reminiscent of some others that Dan tries hard not to think of.

“You have it easy as a baby,” Dan tells him jealously. “You don’t have to do anything. You just shit and cry and sleep and people fawn over you. You’re lucky, you know that?” George gurgles in response, putting his tiny baby hand on Dan’s cheek as Dan switches to carrying him in his arm. He’s stupidly heavy for a baby.

“You don’t have to worry about anything,” Dan says. “I want to be a baby again. Would you swap? D’you want to be a lonely seventeen-year-old boy with no friends to speak of and no future to consider?” It’s oddly therapeutic, talking to a baby like this, because it’s an actual human but they’ll have no recollection of it in later life.

“You’re cute as well,” Dan grumbles as he passes through the huge corridor that contains all the portraits of past monarchs. “How can you be cute if all you do is shit and cry? Those aren’t cute characteristics.” George giggles loudly, patting Dan’s face with his hand so enthusiastically that Dan scrunches his face up, waiting for him to stop. He’s going to get a tiny finger in his eye if George isn’t careful (which he won’t be, because he’s a baby).

“I’m taking you back to your Mum and Dad,” Dan tells him. “You’re trouble, you are.” George’s crinkle-eyed smile looks almost like a smirk as Dan carries him back to Kate and William’s room, pushing open the door with his right hand.

“Enjoyed your walk?” Kate asks as she folds a beautiful green dress that she’d worn on Friday evening. Dan shrugs.

“He’s cute,” he says. Kate smiles.

“You’ll be a good dad,” she tells him. Dan flushes. He’s not ever going to become a dad. He can’t.

“Thanks,” he mumbles, smiling down at George. George flails his hand around a little, catching Dan’s finger and grasping it tightly, wrapping his tiny baby fingers around it like it’s his lifeline. The giggle’s gone; he’s just staring up at Dan, holding onto his finger.

“He likes you,” Kate says. “More than he likes Will.”

“Hey!” William says from across the room. “I’m a great dad.” Kate raises her eyebrows at Dan, but they both know he is.

“Here,” Dan says, handing George back over. “You’ve got a good one there.”

“He’s lucky to have such good uncles,” Kate tells him, taking the baby back off Dan.

“Yeah, right,” William snorts. “The day I let him near Harry will be the day the world ends.”

Kate rolls her eyes fondly at Dan.

Monday and Tuesday pass in much the same way (but without George, Kate and Will), with his father electing not to speak to him unless absolutely necessary. Dan takes to skipping breakfast, although he doesn’t care much that his father’s not talking to him. He can tell it’s a struggle for his mother to not be able to criticise him when he turns up to lunch with the Prime Minister without a tie. She doesn’t say anything, though, so neither does he.

Dan’s up early on Wednesday morning after a late-night Skype session with Phil. He misses Phil’s face, and it’s not really the same seeing it pixelated and diluted on a screen than it is seeing it in real life. Even his eyes look dull and almost lifeless on the screen. It’s better than nothing, though, as Dan constantly reminds himself when he’s feeling low and lonely. It’s better than nothing.

“Alright?” Louis asks when he gets into the bathroom, not looking up from his phone. The two youngest Howells have a habit of getting up at the same time, for no good reason. They’ve just always been like that.

“Been better,” Dan says. “You?”

“Yeah, good,” Louis says, tapping away a message to someone. “Hey, Harry said he’s coming over tomorrow.” Dan frowns.

“Isn’t he meant to be going back to the army?” he asks.

“Yeah, he’s on leave,” Louis says.

“He’s been on leave for a very long time,” Dan says. Louis finally looks up from his phone, if only to throw Dan an exasperated look.

“He’s a prince, Dan, they’re not going to say anything about it, are they?” he points out. Dan scowls.

“Harry always said he didn’t want special treatment,” he says pointedly.

“Harry’s got to get special treatment, because he’s being targeted by the Taliban,” Louis says. “It’s not a choice. Anyway, do you want to see him or not?”

“Obviously,” Dan says, peeved. “We never get to spend much time together, what with him normally being away.”

“Exactly,” Louis says, satisfied. “Oh, and Will’s coming too.”

“What’s the occasion?” Dan asks, surprised. Louis’ face arranges itself in a far-too-casual mask.

“Nothing,” he says nonchalantly – too nonchalantly. “Anyway, I’m going down for breakfast. Want me to bring you anything up?”

“Nah,” Dan says. “I’ll get room service.”

“Suit yourself,” Louis shrugs, swinging his legs over the bathtub and walking out, eyes glued to his phone.

Something’s not right.  
-  
“Did he tell you why?” Phil says when Dan tells him later that night of the events in the bathroom that morning. Dan rakes a hand through his hair, sighing.

“No,” he says. “Just…they never come unless it’s something important, not both of them. Harry yeah, but- the fact they’re coming at the same time, it makes me think something’s up. You haven’t been told about any secret plans to smuggle you here, or anything, have you?” He’s half hopeful, although it’s a joke.

“No,” Phil says, laughing. “I wish.”

“Me too,” Dan says with a sigh.

“Guess you’ll find out tomorrow, though,” Phil says. “They can’t hide it from you forever.”

“Yeah,” Dan says. “In the meantime, let’s talk about something else.”

“Like what?”

“Your cock.”

“Very funny,” Phil says.

“Who says I was joking?” Dan replies.

“You want to cybersex?” Phil asks sceptically. Dan smirks.

“Why, are you offering?” he says. Phil scowls.

“Not anymore,” he says.

“Oh, so you were?”

“No. Fuck off.”

“I’d rather fuck you.”

“Dan,” Phil whines. “Stop it.”

“Stop what?” Dan says innocently, leaning back and pulling his laptop nearer. “Come on, I’m horny, you’re horny. What’s stopping us?”

“You’re always horny,” Phil mutters.

“You complain too much,” Dan tells him. “You should be happy I’ve got such a brilliant sex drive.”

“An insatiable one, you mean,” Phil says. “I can’t believe you want to fucking cybersex with me.”

“When’s the next chance we’ll get to do anything in real life?” Dan points out. Phil pouts.

“This is so gross,” he says.

“So that’s a yes?”

“We’re never discussing this ever again,” Phil mutters, but his hand slips out of the frame.   
-  
Thursday morning dawns bright and early with a heated laptop still on his chest and light streaming into his room from the window due to the curtains he’d forgotten to close. He groans groggily but gets up, walking to the bathroom and (unsurprisingly) finding Louis already in there.

“Will asked whether you wanted Kate and George too,” Louis says when he walks in.

“Er, what?” Dan asks, nonplussed.

“To come over today,” Louis clarifies. Dan’s face clears.

“Oh, right,” he says. “If it’s not an inconvenience and they won’t be bored, then sure.” He likes Kate, and he’s starting to like George. If only babies could talk; he’s sure George would be a hell of a lot better to talk to than any other person in the entire palace.

“Okay,” Louis says easily, whipping out his phone from the back of his skinny jeans and firing off a test, presumably to William. “Harry’s already h-“

“Dan!” Harry says, pulling Dan off his feet into a hug that makes Dan squeal and demand to be put down.

“God, you’d think you haven’t seen me in a year,” Dan says when Harry puts him down. Harry grins.

“I wish. How’re my two little brothers this morning?”

“I’m taller than you,” Dan points out.

“You weren’t when you were three.”

“That’s ‘cause you were bloody ten,” Dan says.

“Still,” Harry shrugs, hopping onto the edge of the bathtub. “Any news from the grand heir apparent?”

“Which one?”

“Oh, I forgot about Phil,” Harry says, but the glimmer in his eyes tells both Louis and Dan he totally didn’t.

“Will’s coming over with Kate and George later today,” Dan says, steadfastly ignoring that comment.

“Wonderful,” Harry says. “I get to demonstrate my immaculate uncle skills.”

“You get to demonstrate your ability to be a twat, you mean,” Louis corrects.

“I’ll have you know I am wonderful with children,” Harry sniffs.

“Wonderfully atrocious,” Louis mutters under his breath, loud enough for Harry to catch it. Harry flips him off with a scowl.

“How’re things with Phil?” he asks Dan. Dan tries not to blush as flashes of last night appear in his mind.

“Good,” he says.

“Still together?”

“Would’ve told you if it were otherwise.”

“True,” Harry admits. “How’s things with Dad?”

“Not talking to me,” Dan says with a shrug, running his finger along the edge of the sink so he doesn’t have to meet Harry’s eyes. “Can’t say I care, though. I don’t have to go down to breakfast anymore, he cares that little about me.”

“Not disowned you though, has he?” Harry says. “That’s a step.”

“That’s only ‘cause of the newspapers,” Dan says.

“Still something,” Harry shrugs. “Anyway, I’m off to harass our dear parents a little more at breakfast. They’ll rue the day they conceived me.”

“I think they started ruing that a long time ago,” Louis tells him, but the two of them file out of the door, leaving Dan standing at the sink by himself.

It’s reminiscent of a long time ago, where he’d stand here, door locked, and look into the mirror, letting every hate-filled thought about himself come flooding into his mind until he had enough there to cause the now-faded scars on his wrists. And Louis would always know, because he’d curl his little finger in Dan’s, and not let go until they were both asleep.

Dan shakes that thought out of his head. Those days are over, and nobody needs to know about them. He’s never going back there; ever.

(But he’s kept the blade, just in case.)  
-  
William and Kate turn up at one in the afternoon, and no sooner are they ushered in than Harry, Louis and Will are striding off down the corridor, leaving Kate and George with a perplexed Dan. Do they not want to be with him? What’s that all about?

“Hey, Dan,” Kate says, moving to one side as the porters carry her luggage in. George waves an enthusiastic, chubby little hand at Dan and Dan has to laugh. He looks so unfeasibly excited; Dan doesn’t want that to fade with age.

“You alright?” Dan asks her as they walk upstairs, following the porters to William and Kate’s room. “Didn’t know you were staying overnight.”

“Will has business to attend to,” Kate says, a faint glint in her eye that makes Dan wonder if he’s missing something.

“But he’s off with Harry and Lou,” Dan says, confused.

“Would you mind taking George for me?” Kate says, deflecting the subject as they enter the room. “I’d like to unpack and he’s an absolute nuisance.”

“Oh,” Dan says, taking the outstretched baby she’s holding to him. “Er, sure.”

“Thanks,” Kate says, smiling. Dan smiles back as he hoists George up, deciding he’ll take him down to the kitchens because he wants some food and the cooks will love fawning over him.

“You are a nuisance,” Dan tells him as they descend through the palace. “A right royal nuisance.” George giggles and knots his little fingers in Dan’s hair again, and Dan can’t be bothered to pull them out. It hurts when he tugs, but Dan can live.

“Bloody abusive, you are,” Dan mutters, wincing as George pulls a few of his hairs out. “Oh, God, I’m being abused by a month-old baby.” George giggles again, clearly finding Dan’s pain amusing, and wrenches a few more of Dan’s hairs out.

“Careful,” Dan tuts, holding him a little further away. “You’ll make me as bald as your Dad.” He stoops into the kitchens through the low stone wall, and everyone immediately scurries to bow and curtsey to him. Dan wishes they wouldn’t – he feels insecure when he’s the centre of attention.

“Would you mind making me a quick sandwich?” Dan asks politely, and everybody nods eagerly as they hurry to fetch ingredients. Dan notices one of the cooks’ eyes lingering on the baby, and walks over to her.

“He’s cute, isn’t he?” he says, and she nods mutely. He’s never spoken to her before; she must be new.

“I’d like some of my own, Your Highness,” she says. “But I’m infertile.”

“Oh,” Dan says with a frown. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It’s alright, Your Highness,” she says, a slight cockney twang to her voice. “I doubt I’d make a good mother anyway. Do you want kids?”

“I’m gay,” Dan tells her. Everyone in the palace knows, and he’s pretty sure most of the outside world suspects, but nobody’s confirmed it either way for them. “And I’m sure you’d make a great mother. Here, d’you want to take him?”

“Oh,” the cook says, suddenly flustered, wiping her hands on her chefs uniform. “I- sorry, Your Highness, I didn’t realise.”

“That’s alright,” Dan says, handing George over, who gurgles and smiles up at her happily. “Only the palace workers really do.” He doesn’t know if she’s even paying attention anymore, beaming down at the baby as she lets him play with her finger.

“Your Royal Highness, your sandwich is ready,” someone calls from across the room and Dan walks over, picking up the tin-foil-wrapped package they offer him with a grateful smile before walking back over to the cook.

“I’ve got to go now,” he says apologetically, and she starts in surprise.

“Oh! Sorry, Your Highness,” she says, handing the baby back over. “He really is a sweetheart.”

“Sometimes,” Dan says, pulling a face as George starts tugging at Dan’s hair again.

“That just means he loves you,” the cook tells him with shining eyes. 

“Funny way of showing it,” Dan says, and the cook laughs. “What’s your name, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Shirley,” she says. “Shirley Sandhurst, Your Highness.”

“Well, Shirley, I’ll see whether Kate feels up to bringing him down later.” Shirley looks torn between speechlessness and wanting to babble on forever, so Dan laughs gently, hoisting George up his hip.

“It’s okay,” he tells her kindly, seeing as she’s new. “Remember, all of us are just people too.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” she says, curtseying hastily.

“Just call me Dan,” Dan says, and she beams, not faltering even as he leaves the room.

“Ow,” Dan complains as he makes his way back up. “You really are a pain. I don’t know if I love you anymore. Here, play with this instead.” He drops the sandwich in George’s lap and George grasps it eagerly, hitting it and clawing at it and biting at it with his toothless mouth.

“If you weren’t a baby, I’d call you an idiot,” Dan says fondly, deciding to go to the white drawing room and see what his brothers are up to. “And if you weren’t Will’s, I’d say you were Harry’s.” He pushes open the door to the drawing room and there’s a sudden flurry of movement as the three Howells that were huddled together spring apart, silencing themselves.

“Er,” Dan says, as George gurgles on his hip. “Have I interrupted something?”

“Yes,” Harry says curtly. “Would you mind leaving?”

“What?” Dan says, surprised at the short manner his brother is speaking to him with. “Right, fine, okay. I’ll go.” He walks back out of the room, half-confused and half-upset. What’s he done to cause his brothers to act like this? Why are they meeting without him? Why won’t they tell him what’s going on?

“Thanks, Dan,” Kate says, when Dan delivers the baby back to her.

“D’you know what’s going on with my brothers?” Dan asks.

“Did you talk to them?” Kate says.

“Not as such,” Dan confesses. “I mean, they just kind of…kicked me out of the room.”

“It’s not my place to tell you,” Kate says unhappily. “I’m sorry, but…you’ll find out soon enough.” Dan nods mutely, but makes his excuses and leaves. It’s not Kate’s fault; she’s a lovely woman and he’s sure she didn’t find out on purpose to spite Dan, but it still stings that she knows and he doesn’t.

Maybe they’ve finally realised that Dan and Phil aren’t worth the fuss, that Dan isn’t worth the bother, and are trying to estrange themselves from him as well. He wouldn’t blame them.


	5. Chapter 5

When Dan shuffles into the bathroom on Friday morning, Louis is in there.

“Oh,” Dan says. “D’you- I can, like, go. If you want.”

“No, it’s okay,” Louis says breezily, hopping off the counter and making to leave. “I’m done here.”

Dan’s stomach sinks a little further, until Louis’ little finger twines itself around his as he pushes past. Then, Dan’s just confused.

He takes his time getting dressed, moving slowly, lethargically, because he doesn’t want to have to go out and face his brothers. He doesn’t even know why they’re all still here.

It’s gone eleven by the time Dan gets out of the bathroom, trying to dart back to his room without anybody noticing him. But as luck would have it (or wouldn’t have it), of course, he leaves just as William is walking up the corridor with baby George on his hips, murmuring softly and trying to pry George’s fists from where they’re clasped on his ear.

“Morning, Dan,” William says. Dan swallows.

“Morning,” he mumbles. William throws him an apologetic look before walking off down the corridor.

Dan hates this. The only people he’s ever had persistent support from, the only constants in his life of inconsistencies, they’re gone now. They’re treating him with caution, keeping him at arm’s length, excluding him from the only thing that’s made him feel warm and safe and loved and trusted. But at the same time, they’re not, are they? Because Louis had interlocked their little fingers today, a gesture that said I’m sorry, I love you, but then he’d walked right out on Dan. And William had thrown him a look that said exactly the same thing when he bumped into Dan, when Dan cast his eyes down to the floor, but he’d walked away as well. So Dan has absolutely no idea what the fuck is going on with his brothers.

He settles for going back to his room and hoping Phil is on Skype, which of course, he isn’t. So Dan pulls up Tumblr and messes around on there for a while, answering a few messages with short, blunt responses until the little notification pops up on the bottom left of his screen; Phil Lester is online.

Dan wastes no time in calling him, drumming his fingers impatiently on the keyboard as he waits for Phil to pick the fuck up.

“Hi,” Phil mumbles, looking tired. “I just woke up. And I’m naked. You couldn’t have waited a bit, could you?”

“Do you think I care that you’re naked?” Dan says. “Makes it better for me.”

“Shut up,” Phil says, but his lips are twitching slightly in a half-smile. “I wanna go back to sleep.”

“It’s like, twelve thirty,” Dan says.

“Yeah, and?”

“Make the most of your day,” Dan says. “What’s left of it, anyway.”

“I think we have our last garden party of the year,” Phil groans. “Kill me.”

“Oh, in that case,” Dan says, heart sinking a little because it means even Phil won’t be there to talk to him. And if he hasn’t got his brothers and he hasn’t got Phil, he’s completely alone, utterly isolated. He has nobody. He is nobody without them. “Get up, get dressed, have fun.”

“Fun,” Phil snorts derisively, but he hoists himself up on his elbows and rubs his eyes tiredly. “Yeah, I’d better get changed, though. I’ll message you when I’m dressed, ‘kay?”

“Sure,” Dan says, trying to sound easy. He’s not sure if it works. “See you later.”

“Okay,” Phil says, biting his lip. “And Dan?”

“Yeah?”

“It’ll be for a good reason. Stop fretting about it.”

Sometimes, Dan hates how well Phil’s got to know him in such a short space of time.   
-  
Lunch is the most sordid affair Dan’s possibly ever had to deal with, ever. Ever.

“Have you done any of your summer schoolwork?” his father asks, directing the question at Louis. Dan and his father have barely spoken since the incident.

“Nope,” Louis says, popping the ‘p’ in a very satisfying way. “Haven’t been bothered.”

“I wonder why,” Princess Elena says, throwing a sour look in Dan’s direction. “I should have known he would be a bad influence.”

“He hasn’t done anything,” Louis says sharply. Dan wishes they would stop talking about him as if he wasn’t there.

“Well, he has, hasn’t he?” Princess Elena says disapprovingly. “I mean, there’s only so much you can take before you stop regarding him as a son-“

Dan’s chair clatters to the floor as he stalks out of the room.  
-  
He’s standing in the bathroom, clutching the sides of the sink and gazing at himself in the mirror.

Brown eyes. Brown hair. Parted lips. Pierced ears. Nothing special. Not unique. Nobody.

(Except he isn’t a nobody, because he’s Prince Daniel James Howell. But he is a nobody, because his family hate him, Phil’s not here, and he hates himself.)

There’s a faint knock on the door and Dan wrenches himself out of the unpleasant daydream he’s found himself in, stumbling back from the sink and trying to hide the haunted ghost in his eyes.

“What?” he snaps.

“Let me in.” It’s Louis.

“No.”

“Come on, Dan,” Louis sighs, and Dan can imagine him resting his forehead against the door. “Open up.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m on the toilet. This is a bathroom, after all. There are plenty of others.”

“But you’re not in any of the others,” Louis says.

“Why should it matter to you?” Dan snaps. Louis is silent for a while.

“Alright,” he says eventually. “Let’s play your game, then.”

Dan listens for soft breaths, quiet words, but hears nothing, and when he pulls the door open, the hallway is empty.  
-  
It’s five p.m. when Phil next gets a chance to come online.

“Hey,” he says, looking kind of flustered. “I’ve got a dinner at seven, so I have to get ready sometime before then. Dan smiles wistfully.

“That’s cool,” he says, even though he wishes Phil didn’t have to go. He can’t have it all ways, though, and he understands what it’s like to be caught in a perpetual circle of school, dinners, lunches, garden parties and ceremonies. He knows what it’s like to be Phil, and he thinks that might be one of the reasons they get on so well – nobody else would understand, unless they lived a life like Dan and Phil do.

“You look tired,” Phil comments, sounding worried, and Dan immediately relaxes every muscle in his face and forces a smile. “That’s not going to help, Dan.” Dan scowls.

“Usually works,” he mutters. “Just didn’t sleep well, that’s all.”

“Sure you’re not stressing over Harry, Louis and William again?” Dan hesitates a moment too long and Phil sighs. “If you’re that worried about it, talk to someone. Talk to them. Tell them. You’re brothers.”

“I can’t just-“ Dan cuts himself off. He can, but he doesn’t want to.

“Can’t or won’t?” Phil asks, as if he knows the very thought is going through Dan’s head right now.

“Can’t because I won’t,” Dan sighs, raking a hand through his hair. Phil blinks, and Dan feels a sudden searing burst of pain, missing the way Phil’s eyes shine. Here, they’re pixelated and dead.

“Dan,” Phil says. “Look, you’re beating yourself up about it when you could just ask them what’s going on. Or ask Kate.”

“Yeah…no,” Dan says. “Can we not talk about it?” It’s making his stomach sink just thinking about the way Louis tried to reach out to him earlier, and the way Dan pushed him away.

“Sure,” Phil says, but his voice is still heavy.

“So, how was the party?” Dan asks, trying to change the subject. Phil shrugs.

“Predictably boring,” he says. “Made conversation with the Duchess of Somewhere-or-other who commented that her daughter would be a perfect match for me.” Dan snorts.

“Your homosexuality not shining through yet?” he says. “Disappointing, after all those orgasms.”

“Dan!”

“That’s me.” Phil scowls at Dan, and Dan just smiles sweetly, wishing with a pang that Phil were there for real so he could push him over and climb onto him and kiss him until someone found them.

“You’re such a dick. I don’t know why I’m dating you.” Dan tries to hide the smile accompanying the warmth that spreads in tingles throughout his body at those words. Dating. It still hasn’t really sunk in.

“Yes, you do,” Dan says, stretching slightly and hearing his back make a satisfying click. “I induce the best orgasms.”

“I have no one to compare it to, so,” Phil says, with a shrug.

“Exactly,” Dan says. “I hereby proclaim myself Prince Daniel James Howell of Orgasms.”

“Aren’t you like, Prince of Wales five times removed or something?”

“Pretty much,” Dan says. “No official title other than prince. Suits me; as if I’d want to have more shit to tell people. Prince Daniel sounds pretentious enough.”

“What about me? I’m Crown Prince Philip Michael Lester.”

“That just sounds like something to do with your head,” Dan frowns. Phil rolls his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Where does the crown go, Dan?” he asks, as if he were talking to a three year old.

“On your- oh.”

“You’re so stupid it actually hurts.” Dan scowls.

“Sorry I’ve had like, two hours sleep,” he says, affronted.

“Yeah, whatever,” Phil says, but he’s grinning. “Hey, I have to go now, alright? Dinner’s soon. But I’ll take my phone down, so text me if you need me.”

“Okay,” Dan says, feeling his stomach sink. He won’t text Phil; he can’t burden Phil with his problems. He feels like such a shit boyfriend, only ever talking about himself and his stupid little family feuds. Fuck.

“Promise?” Phil says, as if he’s reading Dan’s mind, small creases appearing on his forehead.

“Promise,” Dan says, fingers crossed behind his back.  
-  
Dan doesn’t go to dinner. He can’t face his family now.

He takes a walk in the garden instead, well away from his brothers and parents, and thinks things over. He’s always found it easier to think things over when he’s outside, where there isn’t as much clutter and it’s bigger and he feels freer. Inside, he feels cooped up sometimes, when he needs time and space to think things through, because there’s so many things and there’s restrictions and restraints and it hinders his thought process and stresses him out a little. No, when he needs to think, he goes outside.

He’s got baby George on his hip because he apparently causes a huge fuss at the dinner table and he’s already been fed, and Kate wants to go down to dinner because she feels rude staying in the palace and being so secluded from everyone. Dan thinks it’s an excuse to get rid of the baby and give him some more time with George, because he’s grown kind of attached to the kid, but he says nothing about it.

It’s dusk because summer’s ending and the sky is darkening earlier, and it makes Dan’s stomach sink because when summer ends so does everything good and he’s been wondering whether that’s all he and Phil are, just another tragic summer love story.

(Only the difference with them is if it all goes tits up everyone will know about it. And Dan’s father will have been proved right, and he’ll never let it go.)

He wanders as far from the palace as he can, avoiding the yapping dogs that have been let out to play by his mother, and sits down in the glade at the bottom, watching the sky as it turns from bright orange to bleeding red to dusty pinks and purples before fading to a light shade of navy.

It strikes him as inexplicably odd, every time he goes into the garden, that the palace can be so calm and relaxed and quiet when it’s in the middle of all of London’s hubbub.

Because where he’s sitting now, with baby George on his lap, it’s only a few metres from a huge road, taxis and houses and tourists and honking horns and congestion and London. But he can’t hear a thing, can’t see a thing, can’t smell a thing. It’s almost as if stepping out of the palace is like stepping into a different world. Or like stepping into the palace is like a different world.

Which it is, really. It’s out of the world of freedom and choices and into the world of strict tradition and stiff customs, bows and curtsies, balls and dinners and garden parties and dukes and duchesses and earls and so much more, so much that normal people don’t and won’t ever see, so much frivolity and stuff that seems out-dated and stupid to Dan. Dan can’t be who he wants to be, can’t date who he wants to date, can’t dress how he wants to dress, can’t see who he wants to see, and is utterly cut off from the outside world. It’s isolated, it’s lonely, and it’s desolate. It’s the worst thing Dan’s ever had to bear.

“Look at you,” Dan says softly, and George blinks solemnly up at him. “You’re like a brand new notebook. Blank and not bent at the corners.” George says nothing (obviously, because he’s a baby) but his next blink seems a lot more understanding.

“I hope Will’s a better dad than your granddad is,” Dan tells him. “I hope you become a notebook that you fill in, one that has beginnings of stories that have abrupt cliffhangers and doodles and things that make you you, rather than a story with a set beginning, middle and end. That’s what my notebook’s like.” He sighs.

“I think Dad’s pissed at me because I fucked up his perfect little notebook story by getting together with the big evil bad guy that I’m meant to hate. I don’t think he factored love into the equation at all. I don’t think he ever realised that I’d be able to love, because he can’t love, so he doesn’t know what it’s like. I think that’s why he doesn’t get on with Harry either, because Harry’s the most passionate person I’ve ever seen. He embraces everyone with open arms, and Dad doesn’t like that. And we’re leading Lou down that path too, so he’s trying to keep Louis well off it. But because of his inability to love, I don’t think he’ll ever understand me and Phil, or allow it to happen, no matter how much we try to convince him.”

“You know what’s weird?” he says, after a pause. “Well, clearly not, because you’re probably not even consciously thinking right now. But the fact that one day, you’re going to be my age, you’re going to be older, you’re going to be King, and I’m going to look at you and think about how when you were a tiny little baby I confided all my fears and secrets in you…that’s weird. And you’re not going to remember a thing.”

George’s fist clenches around Dan’s collar, almost as if he’s saying I’ll remember. Dan huffs softly, but shifts a little so George’s earnest little eyes are closer to his.

“I’m so sorry you’ve been born into this life, George,” he says quietly. “I don’t want you to have to deal with all the pressure and the pain of being Crown Prince. I wish nothing more for you than being born into a normal world, a world where you can smile and laugh and cry and make mistakes and love without scrutiny and judgement. And I’m going to do my utmost to make sure it’s an easier ride for you.”

Maybe it’s stupid that he feels so fiercely protective of this tiny little blank notebook of a human, but it’s because he can love that he feels it.

Blue eyes blink up at him, and he’s reminded of another love.

He shakes the thought out of his head and decides that dinner’s probably over and he should head back to the palace as the sky darkens to as dark as London can get, the orangey tinge lighting the sky up as far as the eye can see. No stars for Dan.

“Come on, let’s get you back to your Mum and Dad,” Dan says, struggling to his feet and hoisting baby George back onto his hip. George squawks and flails his tiny hands around, and Dan pushes them away from anywhere near his hair or face. “Stop it, you little-“ he cuts himself off with a tut when George finds a way to pummel Dan anyway, and leans as far away from the baby as he can. “Fuck, I’m never having kids.”

The trek up to the palace seems longer than it is (mainly because he has a tiny human abusing him) and he doesn’t bother taking his dew-soaked shoes off, simply traipsing around and muddying all the carpets for his father to find and appreciate.

“Have a good time?” Kate asks when Dan elbows their bedroom door open and hands George back over. It’s almost as if she knows what Dan tells George, how therapeutic it is to talk to an actual person who isn’t a person and hears but doesn’t listen or respond or understand or judge.

“Yeah,” Dan says. “Night.” He doesn’t wait for her to reply before turning on his heel and leaving; he’s still feeling a little off towards her since she knows what’s up with his brothers and won’t tell him, although she can tell it’s stressing him out no end, and William might turn up at any given moment.   
-  
Dan dreams of a grown up George being crowned, handsome in his early twenties, and his eyes finding Dan’s in the rows and rows of people. He dreams of a knowledgeable glint and hidden secrets.  
-  
“…have to throw icy water on him,” a gleeful voice is saying. Dan groans slightly and rolls over, trying to block out whoever is talking way too loudly to get back to sleep.

“Shut up, I think he’s waking up,” someone else hisses, and Dan blinks groggily, waiting for his eyes to focus to make out three figures in the dark.

“Wha’?” he says sleepily. “Wha’s goin’ on?”

“Fuck’s sake, Dan,” a voice Dan recognises – Harry – snaps. “You’re hard as fuck to wake up. Come on, out of bed.”

“Out? No. Don’t wanna,” Dan says, shaking his head and pulling his duvet up over his nose.

“Dan,” Harry says, exasperated, and suddenly the duvet is wrenched off him. Dan curls up into a ball and cries out because it’s fucking cold and he’s tired.

“Why do you hate me?” he whines.

“Get up,” another person says – Louis. “We haven’t got much time, come on.”

“Time for what?”

“Time to get out.”

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see,” Harry says grimly. “Here, Will, take his case down to the car.”

“What case?” Dan rubs his eyes and sits up properly in bed, chasing away the scraps of sleepiness with a yawn.

“Never you mind,” Louis says, grabbing one of Dan’s arms and pulling, making him jerk and almost fall to the floor. Dan squawks indignantly and pulls himself back onto the bed.

“Get out of bed, come on, Dad’ll be coming soon,” Harry says, looking behind him in worry, as if King Edward’s going to be standing there with a thunderous look on his face. “He’ll hear us. Be quick and quiet.” Dan decides not to question his brothers’ antics any further but obey as he doesn’t want any more interaction with his father than strictly necessary, and rolls out of bed, quickly pulling on some jeans and following Harry and Louis, padding silently out into the corridor before slipping into the secret passage that leads to the white drawing room. It’s not far from there to the courtyard where a car is waiting, black and inconspicuous with tinted windows, big enough to hold all four of them.

“Come on,” Harry whispers, motioning for Louis and Dan to hurry ahead to the car whilst his eyes dart around, looking for any sign of someone that will rat them out to King Edward for a better wage.

Dan recognises the chauffeur sitting in front of him as he climbs into the car – it’s the one Louis had told the royal-wave-middle-finger thing to, who’d had a hard time not laughing.

“Everyone alright?” Harry asks, clambering in and slamming the door shut. The chauffeur starts the car immediately, the low rumble of the engine barely noticeable in the night.

“Yeah,” Dan says, as everyone else nods and murmurs in agreement. “Is anyone going to tell me what’s going on now?” Harry, Louis and William exchange a look which turns into a smug grin.

“All in good time, my brother,” Harry says, patting Dan on the shoulder. Dan scowls, but he’s so flooded with relief at having his brothers back that he can’t bring himself to care that much anymore. He can wait to find out what the fuck is going on.   
-  
The car journey takes an extremely long time.

“Thanks for agreeing to do this,” William says to the chauffeur.

“My pleasure, Your Royal Highness,” the chauffeur.

“Not really,” Louis pipes up. “I mean, you could lose your job.” Harry smacks him on the arm, and Louis pulls a what? face at him.

“If I may say so, it would be well worth it, Your Highness,” the chauffeur says. “It is a worthy cause, after all.”

“What is?” Dan wants to know.

“All in good time, Your Highness,” the chauffeur says, echoing Harry’s earlier line, and Dan catches his eye in the mirror.

“Aw, come on,” he says, scowling as the chauffeur hides a smirk. “Even you won’t tell me.”

“I feel extremely rude asking, pardon me,” William says, “but what’s your name?”

“John, sir,” the chauffeur says. “John Smith.”

“No way,” Louis says. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

“Fuck’s sake,” Louis snaps. “You get John Smith and I get Louis Alexander Howell?”

“You are royal, after all, Your Highness,” John says, almost politely apologetic.

“You don’t have to call us Your Highness, John,” Harry says. “You’re doing this for us. You’re a friend now.”

“Thank you, Your Highness,” John says.

“It’s Harry,” Harry says, and Dan catches the tail end of a star-struck smile in the mirror.

“What could be so bad that it gets John fired?” Dan demands. “It’s not fair that everyone except me knows.”

“It is,” Louis says, slouching in his seat and pulling his phone out of his pocket. “I mean, we could tell you, but it’s much more entertaining this way.”

“You-“

“Yep,” Louis grins, flashing Dan a winning smile as Dan cuts off his own sentence, unsure of which curse word is the best one to use to insult his younger brother.

Dan scowls, but turns to watch the scenery pass as the sky turns from a light shade of navy to dusty pinks and purples to bleeding red to bright orange.   
-  
It’s about nine in the morning when someone shakes Dan awake, and Dan jerks before remembering everything that had happened the night before.

“We’re here,” a voice says, and Dan blinks twice and winces at the horrible taste in his mouth before rubbing his eyes and clambering out of the car, stretching and opening his eyes to see where they’ve finally arrived.

It’s their castle, the one by the Welsh border, and for a split second Dan’s confused before he realises-

Wales.

He spins on his heel, mouth agape, and turns to face his three smirking brothers.

“Wales?” he asks incredulously. “To- to Phil?”

“Yeah,” Harry says, sounding extremely pleased with himself. “We couldn’t stand the thought of you moping around and not being allowed to be with the person you lo-want, and we knew Dad would never allow it or understand it, so we took matters into our own hands.”

“And- and Dad doesn’t know?” Louis rolls his eyes.

“Are you crazy?” he scoffs. “Of course not. As if he would have allowed it. We’re pretty much taking you into Lester territory.”

“Speaking of Dad…” William murmurs as his phone begins to ring.

“You gonna answer that?” Harry asks sceptically. It’s clear by the look in his eyes that he’s thinking back to their childhood, the way William was always the good one that was doted on and Harry was scorned almost as much as Dan.

“No,” William says. “Come on, let’s go inside. We all sent our stuff ahead; John’s taken yours in already.” Dan nods, half-speechless, and follows his three brothers who are bickering amongst themselves about how they’ll sort out what King Edward has to say about his four sons disappearing in the middle of the night.

He doesn’t go straight to his room. He goes into the small courtyard first, stands on the quad and looks up at the castle. This has always been his favourite castle, the furthest he can get from Buckingham without going up to Scotland, and it’s beautiful in the morning, golden sunlight on weathered stone. It amazes him sometimes, that the stones he’s staring at and running his fingers along have been stared at and had fingers run along for a thousand years, that the same corridors he’s walking have been walked by ancestors like Henry VIII, Charles I and Queen Victoria. Because it’s then that he realises that his country’s history is his history, and one day, he will be his country’s history. The gay prince that fell for the boy he was meant to hate. Romeo and Juliet.

(He wonders if Shakespeare ever crossed these flagstones.)

When he does go up to his room, stopping to listen to Louis lament about Dad not shutting up and I had to turn my phone off, Will and Harry too, he finds his clothes all neatly stowed away in his wardrobe and his laptop and phone on his desk, plugged in but fully charged. He wrenches his phone out and it lights up, indicating no texts and no missed calls.

It kind of stings a little more than it should, that William and Louis and Harry have had so many calls they’ve had to turn their phones off and Dan’s been overlooked (or rather, ignored).

He checks the time – nine twenty-three – and grins to himself, sliding his phone open and typing in the passcode, scrolling through his contacts to find Phil and calling him.

“Hey,” Phil says, answering on the third ring.

“Hey,” Dan says, unable to hide the grin in his voice.

“You sound happy,” Phil says, sounding surprised. “What’s up?”

“I’ve got a nice view from my window,” Dan says nonchalantly, ambling over and turning his grin to the forest in the distance.

“And that makes you so happy you have to call me to tell me about it?” Phil asks sceptically.

“Yeah,” Dan says. “I mean, forests are fucking beautiful, don’t you think?”

“Forests? You don’t have a forest outside your-“ Phil cuts himself off with a sharp inhale, and Dan bites his lip to stifle a giggle. “Oh my fucking God, you’re not here, are you?”

“Yep,” Dan says, and Phil makes a noise that sounds like a squeal disguised as a cough on the other end of the line.

“Oh my God, seriously?” he asks incredulously. “Wait, hang on, give me five minutes. I’ll be down in the forest in five minutes.” Dan doesn’t even have a chance to say ‘okay’ before the line is cut, and he bites his lip and bounces on the balls of his feet for a little bit, gazing out at the forest with an uncontrollable smile on his face.

He’s going to see Phil.

He reckons he can wait for Phil in the forest so runs out of his room and thunders down the stairs (much to the amusement of a maid at the bottom), wrenching one of the French doors at the back open and running out into the garden and along the path that leads to the mouth of the forest. They probably should have specified an easier place to meet, but this is the place they first met and the only real place they can be together without everyone ogling at them so it felt more natural.

“Phil?” Dan yells, not knowing whether it’s been five minutes or not.

“Dan?” a faint voice yells back. “Is that you?”

“Phil?” Dan shouts, and there’s a distant noise that sounds like bushes being pushed aside that gets closer and closer until a black-haired figure tumbles out of the thicket in front of Dan, straightening up and finding Dan’s eyes with his own blue ones, a smile spreading across his face.

“Dan!” he says, running towards Dan and throwing his arms around his neck. Dan laughs and wraps his own arms around Phil’s waist, realising only just how much he’s missed physical contact and the warmth of Phil’s body against his own and the way his heartbeat spreads throughout Dan’s body.

“Miss me?” Dan teases softly, and Phil pulls back to grin up at Dan, eyes glittering happily.

“All too much,” he says, pressing his lips to Dan’s in a soft, chaste kiss, a kiss that they’ve both been wanting and needing for far too long.

“Fuck, I missed you,” Dan murmurs against Phil’s lips, pulling him closer, and Phil moans slightly, parting his lips for Dan to slip his tongue inside. Dan smirks into the kiss, moaning just because he knows it turns Phil on.

“How long are you here for?” Phil asks breathlessly when they break apart, keeping his arms wound around Dan’s neck. Dan shrugs.

“As long as I want, I guess,” he says. “Or until Dad finds out.”

“King Edward doesn’t know?” Phil says.

“Oh, yeah,” Dan says sarcastically, “I just walked in and said ‘hey, Dad, how does some alone time with my heartily-disapproved-of boyfriend sound to you? Good? Okay cool, call me when you need me back’. What do you think?”

“Yeah, I realised that after I said it,” Phil says, rolling his eyes at Dan’s response. “So, like, how did you get here? Did you sneak out?”

“Will, Lou and Harry brought me,” Dan says, and Phil’s face breaks into a huge smile.

“See!” he crows. “I told you it would be for a reason.”

“Shh,” Dan says shyly, burying his face in Phil’s shoulder. “You’re stupid and I hate you.”

“Except for how you totally don’t,” Phil scoffs. Dan’s about to retort when his phone bleeps, and he frowns. Nobody but Phil ever texts him.

“Who is it?” Phil asks as Dan pries himself away from Phil to pull his phone out and scroll through the notifications to see who’s texted him.

“Harry,” Dan says lowly, unlocking his phone and scanning the message. “He wants to know how open we are about our relationship.”

“Er,” Phil says, frowning. “Pretty open. I mean, I wouldn’t mind the whole fucking world knowing if it weren’t for our parents.”

“You wouldn’t mind the world knowing?” Dan asks, raising an eyebrow as he types out pretty open, why? and sends it.

“Sure, why not?” Phil shrugs. “They’re already speculating about us. William and Kate don’t get too much of the couple stuff.”

“But they’re not the first gay couple, like, ever in royal history,” Dan points out. “And they’re not from feuding families.”

“So they’re not like a Louie-Spenced-up version of Romeo and Juliet is what you’re basically saying,” Phil says.

“Pretty much,” Dan says. “We’d get loads of media attention if the world found out.”

“But would it really be so bad?” Phil asks. “I mean, you’re openly gay, right?” Dan nods – he’s as good as. The whole world suspects it, and he’s never done anything to try and convince them otherwise. “And maybe it would convince my parents that being gay isn’t so bad after all.”

“What, you think dating the son of the person they’d most like to see dead will convince them?” Dan asks sarcastically. “Great plan you have there, Phil.”

“You know what I mean,” Phil scowls. “Like, if the world finds out and people support us, maybe it’ll be okay.”

“What about the countries where being gay is still a capital offence?” Dan asks.

“You’re already open, aren’t you?”

“As good as, but you’re not.”

“Fuck it. I’m the future King, okay, I can fuck up whichever foreign relations I want to fuck up.” Dan sighs.

“I just don’t know whether it would be something you really want,” he says. “Think of all the difficulties.”

“Difficulties?” Phil says. “Oh, you mean the freedom to see you whenever I want and be with you the way I want to be with you and not have stupid family restrictions on shit? That sounds so difficult compared to the way we are now, living easily with our families on the verge of disowning us and banning us from seeing each other under any circumstances.”

“You know what I mean,” Dan says tiredly.

“And I know what I said, and I mean what I said,” Phil says determinedly. “I want to be able to walk around holding your hand and kissing you in public. You read that article – people support us already. Would it be a bad thing?”

“It would be a risk.”

“What isn’t a risk?”

“Staying the way we are.”

“That’s a risk to us,” Phil says. “What if one day one of us decides we can’t take being like this anymore, all secrets and hidden and paranoia?” Dan opens his mouth to retort but closes it again, because it’s true. That is a risk. And when he weighs it up, would he rather have the attention or the risk of not having Phil?

“I guess,” Dan sighs. “I don’t know.”

“Let’s not talk about this,” Phil says. “Let’s go to your room and have some amazing orgasms and kiss a lot, yeah?” Dan grins.

“Yeah,” he says, lacing his fingers with Phil’s and beginning to run through the trees towards the castle, their laughter whipped away by the wind.  
-  
“Ugh, I feel so good,” Phil says lazily, rolling around on Dan’s bed.

“You would,” Dan says, raising an eyebrow at his computer screen. “You just got a blowjob.”

“Yeah,” Phil says smugly. “A very good one, might I add.”

“You got any to compare it to?”

“No, but-“

“Exactly,” Dan says, dragging out the ‘a’ as he scrolls through Twitter. “Hey, Will and Harry never told me they were going on radio.”

“They on now?” Phil asks, rolling onto his stomach and propping his chin up on his hands. “Listen to them. They might have something interesting to say.”

“They must,” Dan frowns. “We’re always being told to stay away from radio. Dad won’t be happy about this.”

“Is your father happy about anything right now?” Phil points out, and Dan cocks his head and raises his eyebrows, conceding as he opens the page with the radio programme playing on it.

“…George?” is what Dan and Phil tune in to, the tail end of a presenter’s sentence suffixed by both William and Harry’s laughter.

“Yeah, well,” William says. “Louis doesn’t like babies and I haven’t been stupid enough to let him near Harry yet.”

“I’m a great uncle,” Harry assures the radio presenter. “I don’t know why he won’t give me a chance.”

“Do you want the comprehensive list or the extensive one?” William asks dryly, and Dan grins as he visualises Harry scowling over the microphones and equipment at his older brother.

“What about Daniel?” the presenter asks. “Do they get on?”

“Oh, Dan and George get on like a house on fire,” William says. “I think George prefers him to both me and Kate. He loves Dan, and Dan loves him too.”

(Phil makes a little ‘aww’ noise that Dan ignores, feeling a blush creeping up his neck.)

“Speaking of Dan,” Harry says. “That’s why we’re here, actually. We were going to make a kind of official announcement. It’s not really official because all I did to get Dan’s permission was text him to ask how open his relationship is, but he said it was pretty open so I’m going to roll with it. Sorry, Dan, if you’re listening, but this will make things a lot easier. Well, once Dad calms down.”

“Prince Daniel’s relationship?” the presenter asks, sounding interested.

(Dan and Phil are both holding their breath. Neither of them notice.)

“Yeah,” Harry says. “He’s actually pretty invested in this one person, someone who makes him happier than I’ve seen him in- well, in his whole life. It’s hard for them to be together, though, because our parents don’t approve. So, in putting this out for the public to see, I think it would be easier for them to be able to be together, instead of having to sneak around as they are right now. I wouldn’t do this if I weren’t a hundred percent sure that their relationship would be supported by the nation, because maybe it will make my anger-blinded father see that their relationship isn’t wrong, just because Dan is a Howell and Phil is a Lester.” 

There are a full five seconds of dead air before a song starts. Harry and William don’t speak again.

Run baby run,   
Don’t ever look back,  
They’ll tear us apart if you give them the chance.


	6. Chapter 6

Neither Dan nor Phil speak for the entirety of the song. It’s only when the final chords ring that Phil reaches forward and clicks off the tab with the radio on it.

“Well,” Dan says, and he’s only half-surprised to find his voice is shaking.

Everyone fucking knows.

The entire country’s going to know by the end of the day. News spreads like wildfire – Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, texting, phone calls, everyone’s going to have the same words on their lips – have you heard about Prince Daniel and Prince Philip?

Dan feels like he might be sick.

“Shit,” Phil says lowly, but he doesn’t sound as fucked over it as Dan does. “That’s- fuck.”

“Fuck,” Dan agrees quietly, bringing trembling hands up to card through his hair, trying to give himself something to do to distract him from the horrible twisting feeling in his stomach.

“Hey,” Phil says gently, catching Dan’s hand and bringing it down, slowly lacing their fingers together. “It’s alright. We’re alright, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Dan says in an exhale. They’re okay. But what if the rest of the country isn’t? What if the press they received was only positive because people thought it was a joke? What if everybody fucking hates them?

As if on cue, Dan’s phone starts buzzing, and Dan’s eyes flick over to see who it is.

Jonathan.

Brilliant. He’d better take that.

“I have to take this,” Dan says, reaching over to grab his phone. “Royal correspondent for the BBC.”

“Oh,” Phil says. “Good luck. Want me to go?”

“No,” Dan says, far too quickly. “Stay.” He swipes the answer bar on his phone and raises it to his ear.

“Dan!” Jonathan says, as soon as Dan picks up. “How are you?”

“Good,” Dan mutters. It’s not that he doesn’t like Jonathan – he does, he loves Jonathan, and he’s been in Dan’s life for as long as Dan can remember so he’s witnessed a fair few things and he still loves Dan – but he just- he knows Jonathan’s primary job isn’t to take care of Dan; it’s to get a scoop for the BBC.

“You know the Beeb want an interview?” Jonathan says, and Dan sighs.

“I’d expected it,” he admits.

“Of course, being the royal correspondent, I’m the one who got lumbered with the task,” Jonathan grumbles. “You up for it? You don’t have to, remember. I mean, you’re fucking royalty. You can do whatever you want.”

“I-“

“Look, before you flat out refuse it, think about it,” Jonathan says quietly. “You’ve known me your whole life, and you’ve done interviews with me before. You know I won’t put anything in you don’t want me to put in, or ask you any questions you don’t want asked. And we can edit it together before anything goes public. The nation – the world – want to know what’s going on, and if I can get the first interview in, we can sort out answers to questions for others.”

Dan sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. Phil touches his forearm lightly, a gentle are you okay? that Dan answers with a brief nod, letting his eyes flutter shut as he considers his options.

“Alright,” he says eventually. “When can you be here?”

“Two hours?” Jonathan offers. “I assume you’re-“

“Yeah,” Dan says. “But Dad doesn’t know.”

“I seem to have accidentally blocked him on my contacts, so don’t worry about that,” Jonathan says, and Dan huffs out a laugh, half-relieved, half-tense. “Two hours. ‘S Prince Philip there too?”

“You’re not interviewing him too, are you?” Dan asks. Phil stiffens beside him.

“No, no, unless he wants to,” Jonathan says. “I assume Wales’ll have someone they want interviewing him. Anyway, I have a lot to sort out and you two need to get your minds straight, so I’ll leave you to it.”

“Yeah, um, okay. Bye,” Dan says quietly.

“Dan?” Jonathan says.

“Yeah?”

“Give him a hug. You both need it.” The line goes dead and Dan blinks, listening to the beep of the dial tone for a moment too long before dropping his phone back on the desk with a clatter and turning around, wrapping his arms around Phil and pulling him in for a tight hug.

“Christ,” Phil mutters, sounding slightly muffled and choked. Dan releases his hold a little bit, dropping his forehead onto Phil’s shoulder with a sigh. It’s not particularly comfortable, Phil leaning forwards as far as he is and Dan leaning down, but it’s warm and comforting and familiar and exactly what Dan needs right now.

“Jonathan’s coming over to interview me,” Dan says after a while, pulling back. Phil fiddles with his collar.

“’S he going to interview me too?” he asks.

“Nah, not unless you want it,” Dan says. Phil scrunches his face up.

“What’s he like?”

“Jonathan? He’s a good man,” Dan says. “Probably way too casual with me for a royal correspondent, but he’s known me since I was born. He’s been with me for all my many crises, and he’s been good through them all. I dunno. He lets me edit interviews, too. Most others are kinda shifty about that, and end up leaking it later anyway.”

“Would he let me?” Phil says. “’Cause the Welsh royal correspondent…I don’t really see eye to eye with him. He’s- well, he’s. Dad’s best friend.” That just about sums it up.

“Yeah,” Dan says, “if you asked him. He doesn’t ask anything you don’t want asking, either. I’ll be there with you, anyway.”

“What, like a joint interview?” Phil says, and Dan shrugs.

“Two for the price of one,” he says, and Phil’s lips quirk up in a small, tired smile. He rolls over on the bed, onto his back, and stares up at the ceiling, and Dan bites his lip.

“You’re not mad at them, are you?” he asks, and it comes out as more of a whisper than he’d intended. “Harry and Will, I mean.”

“No,” Phil says. “I was sick of keeping it all a secret, anyway. We couldn’t have come out by ourselves without fucking something up along the way, so I’m glad they did it for us. I just- yeah. It’s kind of a shock, y’know? And fuck, when Dad hears…” he laughs humourlessly. “They still don’t accept that I’m gay, remember, let alone banging the son of their mortal enemy.”

“I guess,” Dan says. “Maybe this’ll make your parents accept it, though.”

“I don’t know,” Phil sighs. “They’re going to be pissed off as fuck, y’know. Because if they disown me, they won’t have an heir, and the throne will automatically go back to you. And if they don’t, the throne will prospectively land with you anyway, only joint in marriage.”

Marriage. Dan ignores the shiver that runs through him at that word. Generally speaking, his age is far too young to be considering marriage and thinking about the long-term effects of this relationship, but his life forces him to do these things. And he hates it, fucking hates how he has to think well, if me and Phil break up, the tensions between the two nations will get worse or well, if me and Phil don’t break up, we’ll have to get married, and we’ll have to unite the countries, and and and.

“Fuck,” Dan whispers, as it dawns on him. “The fate of two nations is in the hands of our relationship.”

“Yeah,” Phil says, huffing out a laugh in agreement. “Fuck.”

“Let’s not think about this until Jonathan arrives,” Dan says decisively, because it’s making his head and his heart hurt. “Let’s do something else.” Phil tips his head back, making eye contact with Dan and making grabby hands at him.

“C’mon,” he says. “Cuddle me. Or get me off. Or both.”

“Smooth,” Dan says, laughing, but he does both.   
-  
Jonathan arrives, true to his word, two hours later.

“Hey,” he says to Dan, when a maid shows him to the room Dan and Phil are occupying. “Your Royal Highness,” he adds, bowing to Phil, because that’s what he has to do since he’s never met Phil before and Phil’s Welsh royalty.

“It’s Phil,” Phil says, looking vaguely embarrassed, and Jonathan straightens with a grin.

“Thanks,” he says, “makes this job a lot easier .Still gotta call you Sir and Your Highness and Prince Philip in the interview, though. Anyway. How are you?”

“Good,” Dan and Phil chorus. Jonathan eyes them.

“And how are you really?” he says.

“Been better,” Dan admits.

“Yeah,” Phil says in an exhale. “Been better.”

“Well,” Jonathan says, “I thought we should probably do this without a film crew as it’ll make it easier to edit and we’re probably going to have to edit a lot. Do you mind if I tape?”

“Not at all,” Dan says, and Jonathan flops down in a chair next to the bed Dan and Phil are perched on and chucks his voice recorder onto the bed between them.

“Alright,” he says. “Brief outline. I’m going to ask Dan about his sexuality, and then about when you two got together. You alright for the same, Phil?”

“Uh,” Phil says, sounding slightly taken aback, and Dan maybe should have warned him about Jonathan’s brisk, businesslike manner. “Okay, I guess.”

“Brilliant,” Jonathan says, clicking a button at the side of the voice recorder. “So, Prince Daniel. Your relationship with Prince Philip of Wales is the talk of the world.” Dan laughs.

“Yeah,” he says. “I know. Thanks to my brothers.”

“How long have they known?” Dan throws Phil a look.

“Long enough,” Dan says.

“And how long have they known about your sexuality?” Dan knows this is an opening question, one that’s meant to lead to a longer answer.

“Everybody in the palace knew,” Dan says. “I think the rest of the country suspected it, too. I never commented either way. My mother and father were…accepting. Until they found out I was shagging Phil.”

“God, Dan,” Jonathan says, “we’re what, thirty seconds into the interview and you’re already throwing bits for me to edit out in? Do you get off on this?”

“Nah, I get off on Phil,” Dan says, and Jonathan throws him a look that Dan supposes is meant to be withering but is so tinged with mirth that it loses all effect.

“Back to the interview,” Jonathan says sternly.

“Yeah,” Dan says. “I’ve known pretty much all my life, anyway. It was just difficult to have any relationships, being Prince Daniel of England.”

“Were your brothers accepting?” Jonathan says, and he’s got a smile playing on his lips even as he says it, because Jonathan’s known Harry, Louis and Will all their lives too and has watched the four brothers growing up, visited once a week, seen Dan try to dress Louis in a fairy costume, seen Harry comforting Dan and Will comforting Louis when they’d banged heads and hurt themselves, seen the way the four of them always held out against everyone else, forming a special relationship between them that nobody could come between.

“Of course,” Dan says. “I mean, when you’ve got parents like we do, you have to look out for your own.”

“Dan,” Jonathan says, exasperated, and Dan grins. The only way he can calm his churning stomach is making light of the situation, and Jonathan probably suspects it, so he’s letting him get away with more than he usually would. “Come on.”

“Alright,” Dan says. “Go on.”

“We can expand on all that sexuality stuff later, I think,” Jonathan says. “The Beeb wants to get the scoop out as quickly as possible, so I’ll just eliminate the questions and string it all together, maybe make more of a comment about how accepting your family was. That alright?”

“Sure,” Dan says. “Do we get to talk about the juicy stuff now?”

“Of course,” Jonathan says. “Prince Daniel Howell. How did you meet Prince Philip?”

“Our annual trip to the Welsh border had been rescheduled due to Kate’s birth,” Dan says. “It meant that when we were there, Prince Philip and his family would be there too, as they would have returned from their trip to – Ireland?”

“Doesn’t matter, we can edit,” Jonathan says.

“Alright. Well, yeah. I always enjoyed going for walks in the forest in the grounds of the castle we stay in near the Welsh border, and I went for a stroll after the ceremony had finished and happened to stumble across a certain Prince Philip. The words we exchanged at first were…far from amiable, let’s say, but we both calmed down and realised we had a lot more in common than we thought. We then exchanged phone numbers, as I had to leave, and I left.”

“You’re leaving out all the sexual parts, right?” Jonathan says, and Dan rolls his eyes but nods.

“What about our first kiss?” he says. “Surely people will want to know the romantic story.”

“At a later date,” Jonathan says. “That’s tabloid stuff.”

“Oh, look at you, Mr High-and-mighty Broadsheet,” Dan says, and Jonathan swats at him but nods for him to continue. “Anyway. It was the anniversary of the thingy - you can edit that, I actually don’t care – the next week, and all the royal families were meeting up to renew the thingy – I can barely remember the ceremony, okay, editing happens for a reason – and Prince Philip here ended up staying at the palace, along with all the other royal families.”

“Bet he got more of a welcoming than the other royals, though,” Jonathan mutters, and Phil blushes a deep red. Dan throws Jonathan a look, before opening his mouth to continue but closing it again, realising he doesn’t know how to.

“Er,” he says. “We, um. Jonathan.”

“You fucked,” Jonathan says, matter-of-fact, and both Dan and Phil squawk in protest.

“We didn’t!” Dan says. “We just…”

“Blowjobs? Handjobs?”

“No!”

“Oh, grinding. Got it. Okay, I’ll find a way to cover that up.”

“Oh my God,” Phil mutters, burying his face in his hands. “How did my life come to this?”

“You met Dan, love,” Jonathan says. “A rollercoaster at best, a train wreck the rest of the time.”

“He met Harry, Will and Lou when he was staying with us,” Dan says loudly, drowning out more of Jonathan’s sarky comments. “And they left the room, and I kissed him, and Dad – sorry, my father – walked in.”

“Oh, shit,” Jonathan mutters. “Edward’s going to kill me for this bad press.”

“Truth or lies?” Dan asks, because he’s done both before with Jonathan, and doesn’t mind either way.

“Go for truth,” Jonathan says. “It’s important for other kids out there.”

“Alright,” Dan says, and he takes a deep breath. “My father found us, and he was livid. He told me I was never to ever speak to or of Prince Philip again. I carried on texting him, however, and talking to him. Then my brothers stopped speaking to me.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, everyone’s going to have to abdicate when this story breaks,” Jonathan says.

“Hey, hear me out,” Dan says. “That’s what I thought. And I used to distract myself with George, take him out and talk to him.” Phil makes a small sound that sounds far too much like a coo for Dan’s liking, and he feels himself start to blush. “And then one night I woke up to Louis and Harry and Will talking above me, and they snuck me out here.”

“How romantic,” Jonathan smirks. “And now, Phil, if you don’t mind, your side of things? We don’t have to talk about the relationship, since we know it from Dan’s perspective and the Welsh are going to hate us enough for nabbing your story first, but if you don’t mind, talking about your sexuality?”

“Sure,” Phil shrugs, “why not?”

“Why not indeed,” Jonathan says. “I’ll just give you free reign; you don’t seem as difficult to control as Dan. I have to give him structured questions for a reason.” He throws Dan a mock-glare, and Dan grins at him in response.

“I’ve known my whole life that I was gay,” Phil says. “My parents aren’t as accepting as Dan’s. In fact, they point blank refuse to acknowledge that I am gay and that I’m not going to marry a princess and have a lovely little heir for their family line to continue. They tend to completely ignore me, thinking maybe if they ignore my sexuality it’ll go away, and I don’t have any siblings, which has led to a pretty lonely life. So you can imagine what it was like when I was introduced to Dan, first to have a friend, and then to his brothers.”

“I pity thee,” Jonathan says, with feeling. Dan aims a kick at his shin and misses.

“My parents still don’t know about me and Dan. Well; they will by now, I expect, but before Harry and Will went live on radio, they had no clue. So I’m yet to hear their reaction to the news.”

“Shit,” Jonathan says. “Good luck, kid.”

“Thanks,” Phil says, and his voice wavers for the first time. Dan’s fingers find his on the bed and he laces them together, squeezing Phil’s hand once as reassurance – I’m here, we’re okay, so it’s okay.

“That’s all,” Jonathan says. “I can string something together out of this, no thanks to you, Dan Howell.”

“You’re welcome,” Dan says, grinning at Jonathan as he stands up, clicking the ‘off’ button on the voice recorder.

“I’m going to go back to the office, write something up along the way, send you a draft before I send anything to the big boss and then you can check it over and see whether you want anything else changing, and then I’ll send it off. Sound alright?” Jonathan says.

“Sounds good,” Dan says.

“Alright, then. Bye, boys!” Jonathan says cheerily, making his way towards the door. “Oh, and Dan,” he says, pausing with his hand on the doorknob. “You keep him, won’t you? You keep him safe, and you keep him.” With that, he opens the door and leaves, the sound of the door shutting behind him echoing in the stillness.

“I like him,” Phil says after a moment. “He makes me feel like I’m the one controlling what goes out to the press.”

“You are, when Jonathan’s in charge,” Dan says. “You alright?” Phil doesn’t have the chance to answer because as soon as the words leave Dan’s mouth the door crashes open again and three figures tumble in.

“Was that Jonathan I just saw?” William says.

“Did you hear us on the radio?” Harry asks.

“This room smells like sex,” Louis comments, wrinkling his nose.

“Yes, yes, and thanks,” Dan says.

“Thanks for what?” Louis says. “I never said it was a nice smell.”

“How do you even know what sex smells like?” William asks Louis sternly, and Harry throws Dan a shit, let’s end this before it starts look.

“Hey, let’s talk about the radio thing,” Harry says hastily, elbowing William and throwing himself down in the chair Jonathan’s just vacated. William and Louis perch on the chaise at the side of the bed. “Did we overstep a line?”

“Kinda,” Dan says, and Harry pulls a face.

“It was necessary,” he says. “You guys couldn’t keep your hands off each other. Someone was going to notice something, and Dad would have put even more stringent rules into place. And if we’d properly asked you, you would have dithered and come up with more non-existent cons than existent pros.”

“For the record,” William says, leaning forwards. “I didn’t want him to do it either. He talked me into it.”

“Oh, shut it,” Harry says, rolling his eyes. “Hope you weren’t in the middle of fucking, or something.”

“Just finished,” Dan tells him, although it’s not strictly true. Louis pulls a face.

“Oh, the days where I could be aroused,” he says mournfully, and Dan chucks a pillow at him.

“How did you really feel about it, though?” William says anxiously.

“At the time, kinda shit,” Dan admits. “More scared than anything. I’ve kind of warmed up to it now. Jonathan helped.”

“So it was Jonathan,” Harry says. “Was he here for the scoop?”

“No, he travelled two hours to give me some ice cream,” Dan says. “It was really good.”

“That better not be a euphemism,” Louis says, “because you’ve already made me erectally dysfunctional.”

“That’s not a word,” Dan says.

“I’m Prince Louis of England,” Louis says. “You think I give a shit?”

“Did he interview you too?” Harry asks Phil, who’s still looking a bit overwhelmed. Dan keeps forgetting the poor kid’s only met the lot of them once.

“Yeah,” Phil says. “He was really nice.”

“That’s Jonathan for you,” William says warmly. “He’s lovely.”

“He is,” Phil agrees.

“Have either of you heard from your respective parents yet?” Harry asks.

“Haven’t looked,” Phil says.

“Haven’t wanted to,” Dan adds.

“You can’t avoid them forever,” William says gently, and Dan sighs.

“We can try,” he says. “Phil’s parents can’t do anything, anyway. Unless they try to extradite him.”

“Which, knowing them, they might,” Phil says.

“It can’t be all that bad,” Harry says. “If you want, we can stay here with you when you call them, and if they start talking shit we’ll tell them exactly what we think of their opinions.” Phil looks slightly overwhelmed, taken-aback in the best of ways.

“You’d do that for me?” he says quietly, sounding awed.

“Of course!” William says. “You’re family now.”

(Dan thinks he might have just lost Phil to all three of his brothers.)

“Thank you,” Phil says, and it comes out as a whisper.

“It’s nothing,” Harry shrugs. “Family’s got to stick together. Who’s going to call first?”

“I’ll go first,” Dan says, because although he’s hardly confident, he’s more confident than Phil must be because he’s already had his parents’ initial reaction to the relationship. Louis reaches behind him and picks up Dan’s phone, chucking it over at him, and when Dan presses the home button to unlock it it shows fifty-three missed calls from his father and two from his mother.

“So much for motherly love,” Harry mutters, and Dan huffs out a laugh before swiping at the Father – Missed Call (53) tab on the screen and raising the phone to his ear. It rings once before his father answers.

“I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for hours,” he shouts. “Where have you been?”

“Busy,” Dan says defiantly. “What’s it to you?”

“What’s it to me? What’s it to me? I wake up to a distressed maid telling me all four of my sons have gone missing during the night along with one of the cars, a chauffeur hasn’t turned up to work, and then hear the news that your so-called relationship with that Lester kid has been broadcast to the entire world not by a tabloid column but by my own sons, your own brothers, my kin!” King Edward roars. “I am livid with all four of you. Come back home right this instant. And stop this silly Lester nonsense, Daniel. I told you where you stand on this one.”

“I don’t care,” Dan says.

“What?” King Edward yells. “You have the nerve, after all these years-“

“No, Dad, you listen to me for once,” Dan says, feeling his own temperature rising. “You need to put this petty feud behind you. It wasn’t even your generation that had this stupid argument. Phil – yes, he has a fucking name, and I’ll curse as much as I please, Dad – is a wonderful person. He’s accepting, loving and caring in ways that you could never be, and he’s shown me love in ways you never have. If you gave him a chance instead of being so damned prejudiced just because of his name, his background, his heritage, you’d like him too.”

“I doubt it!” King Edward says, voice still at a dangerous volume. “He’s a Lester, Daniel, they’re all the same.”

“Why do you hate them so much?” Dan explodes. “For pity’s sake, put it behind you. Grow up. It wasn’t your war, so don’t continue it. It’s over now, and it’s been over for a whole bloody century. Let it go. I have nothing to do with it, and Phil certainly has nothing to do with it. His ancestors, yes, but he’s not them. I’m not my ancestors either. We’re a new generation, and we’re not going to stand for the stupid bullshit cold war feud that you do.”

“I won’t stand for this,” King Edward says. “My own sons, plotting against me.”

“Call me when you feel like actually talking,” Dan says, because the white-hot anger that’s pulsing through his veins is getting dangerously close to spilling into his mouth, controlling his lips and tongue, and he’s in enough shit as it is.

“Well,” Harry says into the silence after Dan hangs up. “That could have gone worse.”

“He’s still talking to you, at least,” Louis says, and Dan grimaces.

“Half-wish he wasn’t,” he says.

“Well,” Louis says. “He’s not going to disown you, because he knows the rest of us won’t stand for it and we’ll all pre-abdicate – is that a word? – and then he won’t have an heir. God, I’ve only just thought of that. I bet he’s pleased.”

“Thanks for the moral support,” Dan says sarcastically, but he’s starting to feel a little better now, a little calmer, a little less fuck the system and a little more Phil just run away with me.

“My turn, I guess,” Phil says, and he sounds so afraid that Dan pulls him in for a quick kiss, pressing their lips together gently, a soft reminder that he’s there, they’re all there, no matter what Phil’s parents say.

When they break away, Harry and William are looking at them with softened features, but Louis’ staring at his dick.

“Rest in peace,” he says sadly, and Dan chucks another pillow at him.

Phil’s phone is produced from somewhere and handed to him, and he unlocks it with slightly trembling fingers, pressing one on speed-dial and lifting the phone to his ear.

It doesn’t even take a ring for his parents to answer.

“Where are you?” are the first words out of Phil’s father’s mouth, sounding tinny in the silence of the room.

“It doesn’t matter,” Phil says. “Not Wales.”

“Come back home this instant,” Prince Charles says, and his voice isn’t loud and angry like King Edward’s was – no, it’s quiet and poisonous and if Dan were Phil, he’d be throwing the phone down on the bed and running into someone’s arms.

“No,” Phil says, but his voice wavers.

“We already told you to stop this homosexual nonsense,” Prince Charles says. “Your mother is extremely distressed and has been taken ill.”

“She deserves it, if she can’t accept that her son’s gay and happily in a relationship.” Shit.

“You are not in a relationship with that Howell boy,” Prince Charles says. “I won’t allow it. You are not gay, and you are not together with that Howell.” Harry grabs Phil’s phone out of Phil’s hand so fast that Dan barely sees it until he chucks the phone onto the bed, speakerphone on.

“Hello, Prince Charles,” he says, faking amiable, but Dan can hear the dangerous undertone to his voice.

“Who’s speaking?” Prince Charles asks.

“Prince Henry of England,” Harry says sweetly. “I’m delighted to tell you that I’m joined by Prince Louis of England, Prince William of England and Prince Daniel of England. Say hello, boys.”

“Hello,” everybody choruses obediently, because when Harry fucks someone up, he does it properly.

“Now, I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation with my dear friend Phil here,” Harry begins.

“It’s Philip,” Prince Charles corrects, “and Prince Philip of Wales to you.”

“I swear to God, Harry, if you call me that,” Phil mutters, and Harry laughs.

“I’m ever so sorry, Sir, but your son here seems to have other ideas about that,” Harry says sweetly. “Seeing as it is his name we are discussing, I deem his opinion more worthy. Speaking of worthy opinions, shall we mention yours? Your bigoted, homophobic, genuinely disgusting views? How about that, Sir?”

“How dare you,” Prince Charles spits. “How dare you suggest I am bigoted?”

“Oh, I’m doing more than suggesting, Sir,” Harry says. “I’m explicitly telling you. Your views are bigoted, and they are disgusting. Phil here, is a homosexual. That may mean he likes having another man’s cock up his arse, or it may mean he likes putting his cock up other men’s arses. Do you want to have your cock up a man’s arse, or vice versa?”

“Absolutely not,” Prince Charles spits.

“Good, Sir, because then you can understand why Phil does not want his cock anywhere near a woman’s genitals. It’s the same concept. So, we’ve covered the Phil’s-gay-deal-with-it point, where are we headed now? Ah, yes. Your views on his relationship with my dear brother.”

“He is not in a relationship with anybody, let alone a Howell,” Prince Charles hisses.

“Pardon me, Sir, but I believe you to be wrong,” Harry says. “Dan, would you tell the nice man your relationship status?”

“I’m taken,” Dan says.

“And by whom?” Harry says.

“Phil Lester.”

“And how about you, Phil? Are you single, taken, married, divorced, engaged?”

“Taken,” Phil says. “By Dan Howell.”

“Oh dear, Sir,” Harry says, turning back to the phone. “You seem to be mistaken.”

“There is absolutely no way that any son of mine is in a relationship with a Howell. I will not allow it.”

“It’s rather odd that you should say that,” Harry says. “The law in Wales states that gay marriages are allowed. Love is love, no matter what sex the two people are. Additionally, there is no law that says parents – or anybody – have the right to decide which relationships their sons and daughters enter into.”

“Philip is a prince,” Prince Charles says lowly. “The future of his nation rests with him.”

“Now,” Harry says conversationally, “I’ve been thinking, Sir. I have the heir to my country’s throne here with me – say hello, Will-“ William does so “-and he happens to be rather fond of our Phil. Not in the way that Dan is, of course, because he is married with a child, but fond in a brotherly sense. Of course, nothing is concrete just yet, but I suspect the two of them have hashed out a rough plan for an agreement to rule the two countries with great emphasis on the friendship between the two of them they are ruling respectively, regardless of whether Dan and Phil stay in a relationship or not. And, of course, if Dan and Phil do happen to stay in the relationship they are currently in – I do apologise, Sir, I just enjoy reiterating the point – the two countries will, of course, be joined in holy matrimony, like Dan and Phil themselves. And, Sir, you won’t be able to do anything to stop it, because you will be dead. Now, what I suggest is that you take a while away from your son and your wife and everybody around you to mull things over and think about what you would like to be remembered as, what you would like your legacy to be. And I would also suggest that you think about your son, and what’s best for him, and I emphasise that you should be thinking about what’s best for him, as it generally coincides with you getting over your bigoted views. In less than a year, he comes of age, and he can pass up the throne if he wants, which means it will pass back to my family anyway. We accept him as family; we are his brothers. You are his father, and you need to finally be a father to him. He’s waited long enough. Have I made myself clear?”

There’s a pause.

“Crystal,” Prince Charles says, sounding faint, and then the dial tone sounds, signalling him hanging up.

“Fuck,” Louis murmurs after a good thirty seconds of nobody speaking.

“I love fucking people up like that,” Harry says gleefully. “I hope I didn’t overstep any lines or anything, Phil. Unless they were lines which pissed your dad off, because no offence, but he’s a class A twat.”

“That was amazing,” Phil says, sounding shocked and in awe and the four Howells can’t help but laugh because yeah, they’re used to Harry fucking people up and around and off, but this is the first time Phil’s seen it in action.

Dan laughs along, watching the fond smile on Harry’s face as he looks at Phil, the genuine smile on Louis face as he laughs at Phil’s reaction, the happy smile on William’s face as the brothers’ laugh.

And as he laughs, he thinks that Harry and William must have picked that song for a reason.

Because Harry, Louis and William aren’t giving anyone the chance to tear Dan and Phil apart.


End file.
